Beautiful Beast
by VTPfirewolf137
Summary: Long ago, the dark sorceress Natalya placed a curse on Berwald and his household, trapping them in his castle. 200 years later, when a dying boy named Tino braves the forbidden land of the forest, he is saved by the reclusive master of the house. The two begin to fall in love which Berwald didn't think could happen for someone like him. Loosely based on Beauty and the Beast. SuFin
1. Prologue: Where It All Begins

Full Summary: The Atall Forest has long been a forbidden place to enter. It is said to be the domain of an ancient hell-beast, raised from hell by an evil sorceress, and those foolish enough to enter his realm never return. But Tino has nowhere else to run. Freezing and dying from a mysterious illness, he is rescued by a strange sorcerer named Berwald who cures him and protects him. Tino finds out that Berwald is, in fact, the 'Beast' that everyone fears, but Tino doesn't understand how a man as kind as him could be scary. He learns that Berwald and his household suffer from a two-centuries-old curse that was placed on them by the dark sorceress Natalya and there is no way to break it. Regardless of his apperance, Tino begins falling in love with the Beast.

But with Natalya's return, the clouds of war gather, and everyone Tino holds dear is threatened. What can one small, powerless boy like him do to defend his loved ones from a woman consumed by her own dark powers and her army of loyal followers?

* * *

Prologue—Where It All Begins

Our story begins many, many years ago in a frigid, northern land with a young sorcerer named Ivan Braginsky. The Braginskys were the most feared and respected family of sorcerers in all of the north. For generations, this family used their powers to rule over the land, much like a royal family, but they also used their powers to protect their lands and people. Dmitri Braginsky, Ivan's father, was rumored to have slayed a dragon in his youth, and Dmitri's wife and sister, Darja, had cured many thousands of people of the plague.

Ivan, a powerful sorcerer in his own right, was a worthy heir. By the time he was fifteen, he had been able to summon demons and will them into submission. Ivan was twenty-four, and his power had increased seven-fold since then. Dmitri looked on his son with pride, knowing that he would continue their proud family line after he was gone.

Ivan was a tall man with pale blond hair, smooth white skin, and violet eyes. Even without magic, he was quite a formidable opponent, and he could wrestle a bear to the ground with his bare hands. He could have had any woman he wanted, had he been allowed to choose for himself. However, there was a tradition in Ivan's family that required all male heirs to marry and have children with their sister, so as to continue the line of power. But Ivan did not want to marry either of his sisters.

His older sister, Katyusha, probably would have been the more preferable of his two sisters. She was a bit of a crybaby, but she was a kind soul and everyone liked her. However, Katyusha was not a sorceress. Although she was gifted with the power to undo any curse, Katyusha had no power of her own, so she was free to marry whomever she pleased.

His younger sister, Natalya, on the other hand, was a sorceress and a very powerful one at that. Even at her young age, she was quite possibly the most powerful sorceress their family ever had. She was especially adept in the art of black magic, a kind of magic that was heavily reliant on trickery and clever word play. Indeed, she was the trickiest and the cleverest of all who use the dark arts.

She was also considered to be the more beautiful of the two sisters, with her long, slivery-blonde hair and her sparkling, purple-blue eyes. But for all her beauty and her prowess in the magical arts, Natalya was more than a little messed up in the head. She was terribly violent toward everyone around her. The servants in the Braginsky household did everything they could to stay as far from her sight as possible, since she regularly slaughtered servants who came near her, all the while laughing maniacally. On several occasions, Natalya put a nasty curse on some poor soul, and Katyusha was the only one able to put them back to normal.

Natalya was always bitter towards her elder sister for this. She wasn't even a sorceress, yet Katyusha could use a kind a magic not even she was capable of using. Natalya frequently lashed out at her. She would hit her and scream at her. Once she beat Katyusha unconscious, and then cut her hair off. Despite the abuse, Katyusha was always kind and loving to her sister, which only further enraged Natalya. She warned Katyusha that one day she would kill her.

Natalya acted quite differently with Ivan, however. She was not violent toward him in a physical, verbal, or magical way. Toward him, her attacks were more sexual in nature, which disturbed her brother to no end. Natalya was well aware that one day she would marry Ivan, and she accepted her fate with gusto.

Ivan absolutely did not want to marry Natalya. There was no other person he feared more than his own little sister. And so, to avoid his fate for as long as possible (he knew he would not be able to escape forever because Natalya would hunt him down eventually) Ivan left his home with the excuse that he wanted to seek out other sorcerers and learn from them.

Finally free, he set out to the west (after telling his family he was heading south). He had heard rumors that far to the west, there was a sorcerer with god-like powers, so Ivan settled on seeking this man's tutelage. Perhaps if he learned from this man, he could become more powerful than Natalya. The man's name was Oxenstierna, but he was mostly known by the nickname 'the Lion.' Whispers of this great man had reached even as far as Ivan's country. _'Did you hear what the Lion did?' 'Yes, I heard that he raised an entire city off the ground to protect it from flooding.'_

After six months of traveling and finding his way by following rumors, Ivan found himself at the edge of a dark, snow-covered forest called Atall. The rumors said that within this forest stood the castle where the Lion lived. The rumors also said that the forest he lived in was enchanted and that the only way to find the castle was to become completely and utterly lost, which was not a problem for Ivan who had decided that the best way to become lost was to enter the forest blindfolded.

He walked around in the forest with his eyes covered for the first several hours, hands outstretched to avoid bumping into anything. It was slow going, but eventually he decided that he was lost enough, so he took off his blindfold. He walked farther and farther into the forest until night began to fall. He started a fire and ate some of his rations of deer jerky. Shortly after, he fell into a deep sleep inside his rollout bed.

Ivan awoke with the bright, morning sun on his face. As he packed his gear, he silently prayed that the rumors had been true and that he was not lost in this wilderness for nothing. But when he slung his pack over his shoulder, he saw something in the distance that he was sure had not been there the night before. Looming over the highest branches, he saw the towers of a great castle. A smile grew on Ivan's face at the sight of it. He hastened his steps, almost skipping in his joy.

When the great door to the castle came into view, he saw blue flags with the image of a golden lion, and Ivan knew for certain that he had found the right place. This castle was a bit different from others he had seen. It had no outer wall protecting it, nor were there any guards patrolling the perimeter, although he supposed that was what the enchanted forest was for. One could literally walk right up to the front door and knock.

After a few moments of waiting, there was a loud clunking sound from the other side as the door was unlocked. The heavy piece of wood opened loudly with a horrible screeching sound from the hinges.

A young, blonde woman, probably in her early-twenties by Ivan's account, opened the door.

"Good morning sir," she greeted in the language of her country. She spoke softly and though she had a deep voice for a woman, Ivan immediately thought it was beautiful. "What brings you to my home?"

"Good day ma'am. I am sorry to bother you so early," Ivan replied in her language. "My name is Ivan Braginsky. I came here to seek the tutelage of the great sorcerer, Master Oxenstierna. I was told I would find him here."

At his words, the woman's face fell. "I am sorry, good sir. You must have travelled a great distance to get here, but my father, the man you seek, has been dead for a year now."

Ivan's heart sank in his chest. "I see," he replied quietly. "Thank you for your time." He turned away from the woman, deciding that he would just have to find someone else to study under. After all, the main point of his journey was to get away from his sister for as long as possible.

"Wait! Good sir," the woman said. Ivan turned back to her. "Please stay and rest before you leave. You must be weary of the road. I can provide you with a warm bed and hot food. And it may not count for much, but you can have access to my father's library, where he collected everything he knows about magic." She had a desperate look on her face. Perhaps she was not able to leave this place. Or perhaps she was alone and wanted company.

Ivan smiled at her. "Thank you ma'am," he said. "That would be much appreciated." The woman smiled back at him and led him inside. The castle seemed empty of life except for this woman. "Are you the only one here? Are there no servants or any others living with you?" he asked.

"No, I am alone here," she said with a sad look on her face. "Before my father passed away, he used his magic to make fake servants that did all the work in the castle. When he died, they disappeared. And there was never anyone else living here, other than my mother, father, and I. My father was quite a recluse. He didn't like people coming around and interrupting his work. He only took my mother as his wife because she was mute." She gave a small laugh at that. "He always said it was her most beautiful quality." The woman looked at Ivan. "I apologize. All my chatter must be terribly boring for you."

"No, not at all," Ivan replied. "It soothes my soul to hear the voice of another after such a long journey and I find your story very interesting."

The woman smiled shyly at his response. "Thank you," she said. They stopped in front of a wooden door and she unlocked it with a brass key. "This can be your room. I believe it's the least dusty since it was used more recently." She ushered him in. "I will leave you to unpack your things and wash up. When you are done, just come knock on my door. It's the one at the end of the hall on the left, and then we can have lunch."

"Thank you ma'am," Ivan said. As the woman was closing the door, Ivan thought of something. "Wait miss! I just realized I do not know your name."

"Oh, I'm sorry!" she said, coming back through the door. "How silly of me to forget to introduce myself. I am Maja, Maja Oxenstierna."

"Thank you, Maja, for your hospitality."

"The pleasure is all mine," she said, and with that, she left him alone.

Ivan unpacked his things quickly and washed himself as best as he could. It took him a few moments to figure out how to get water out of the strange pump in the bathing room. He was pleasantly surprised when hot water came out. Apparently not all of Master Oxenstierna's magic had faded with his death.

As he bathed, he thought about this new and interesting woman. Maja was certainly beautiful, with her long blonde hair extending down to her waist, her smooth, pale skin, and her intense blue eyes. She had the look of a strong, fierce woman. Her nose was sharp, her cheekbones were angular, her shoulders were wide. She looked like she could be a warrior.

When he had finished bathing and dressing, he looked for Maja's door. He found it, knocked, and she answered.

"Are you ready for lunch?" she asked. Ivan nodded and arm-in-arm, she led him to the kitchen.

What happened the rest of that day is not of much importance. What is important, however, is that in the end, Ivan stayed much longer than he had planned. Much, much longer.

He found Maja's father's vast library more than sufficient for his studying needs and he spent many months reading every book he could. But that was only part of the reason he stayed. The truth is that he came to find Maja's company more and more enjoyable with each passing day, to the point where he fell in love with her. When he found that Maja felt the same about him, they got married. Maja knew about his sister and that he wanted to escape her, and she agreed with him that it would be best if he took her name.

They lived happily together in their castle, and while Ivan never could figure out how to remove the enchantment from the forest, he managed to hire a staff of people brave enough to trust his instructions for finding the castle.

Five years after Ivan first came to the castle, Maja gave birth to a strong, healthy baby boy. After much arguing over whose father he would be named after, they named him Berwald, after Maja's late father. From the day he was born, Berwald was a quiet child with an intense stare that reminded Ivan of both Maja and his sister. Berwald grew up quickly. He was very serious and thoughtful, seeming to live in his head. At five, he was very tall and it was clear he got his stature from his father. When he was old enough, Ivan began to teach his son sorcery, which Berwald took to like a fish takes to water. He sucked up all of the information given to him very quickly and was able to remember everything.

To Ivan, it seemed like twenty years had gone by in a flash. He and his wife were now in their forties, and Berwald was now fifteen and almost as good a sorcerer as his father. The majority of their original staff (Maja refused to call them servants) had retired and had been replaced mostly by teenagers and men and women in their twenties, who were desperate enough for a job that they risked the enchanted forest. It had been the best years of Ivan's life and he had cherished every moment given to him.

He did not expect that it would all end in tragedy.

After twenty years, he had almost forgotten about Natalya. He thought that he was forever beyond his violent sister's reach. He never thought that she would be so persistent that she would continue to search for him after all these years. But she did.

She came to them one evening in the middle of a snowstorm with a pouch of deadly poison, her preferred method of execution, tucked into her corset. She knocked on the door and Roderick, their doorman, answered. She told him that she was lost and seeking shelter from the storm, so she was let in and allowed to warm herself by the fire. She had put a glamour over herself, so Ivan did not recognize her.

Natalya itched to murder them all when Ivan introduced her to his wife and son, but she gritted her teeth and smiled politely. When she saw the boy, she realized that she had made a mistake. She had not anticipated a child and had not brought enough poison to kill all three of them. Something else would have to be done with the boy. When night fell and the household retired to bed, she prepared her revenge. She knew just what to do with the boy, but first she would have to deal with his parents.

Ivan and Maja were already fast asleep in their bed. Natalya sneered at them. They'd be sleeping together for all eternity now. She whispered a spell making two cups filled with lethal doses of the poison float toward her victims. The poison she used was called eitr and it was her favorite poison of all. It came from the sap of a pretty, green plant. If you saw the delicate little bush, you'd never guess the dark properties those bright green fronds held.

Simply ingesting the black liquid that the plant bled would cause terrible illness, but it would not kill a person (at least, not immediately). But if injected directly into the blood stream, the eitr sap is lethal. In addition, both ways would allow a dark sorcerer to feed from the life of their victim, although only injecting the poison into a person's veins would allow a sorcerer to drain their magic power.

As Natalya whispered her spell, the eitr flowed out of the cups in ribbons as thin as straw and pierced Ivan's and Maja's skin. They didn't even stir until the poison started to take effect. Natalya felt the precious energy of life flow into her, along with Ivan's immense power. She smirked, realizing that if she had given Ivan a fair fight, he might have been able to beat her, but now all of his power belonged to her. His life belonged to her.

In their final moments, as the poison painfully gouged out their last scrapes of life from their bodies, Ivan and Maja awoke. They screamed, both of their faces were contorted in pain, but through it all, a flicker of recognition passed of Ivan's eyes.

"Na—Natalya," he choked out. He tried to say a spell, but Natalya's power was too great and nearly all of his magic had left his body. Maja's screams died down in favor of sobbing and gasping for her last breaths. "Maja, I'm sorry," Ivan said. He struggled to find her hand in the darkness. He held her trembling fingers and let out a sob when she went completely still.

"Hahaha!" Natalya laughed. "She's gone now, but don't worry. You'll be joining her soon."

Tears streamed down Ivan's face. He could barely move. He couldn't fight her.

Footsteps pounded down the hall outside and the door flew open.

"Mother! Father!" Berwald yelled, shock written all over his face.

"Run Berwald! Get out of here!" Ivan yelled with the last of his strength. But Berwald stood there, frozen in shock, until Natalya smirked and threw him against the wall with a spell.

"You stay right there like a good boy," Natalya giggled. "I'll get to you once I'm finished with your dear parents." Berwald struggled, but he couldn't do anything against her power. She was too strong and she had put a gag-spell on him so he couldn't use any magic.

"Natalya," Ivan whispered. "Please… don't hurt him… he's just a… boy." Ivan fought to keep his eyes open as the fog of death closed in on him.

"Oh don't you worry, dear brother. I won't hurt your little spawn. I'm just going to make him a miserable little rat trapped in a cage for the rest of his life."

The last of Ivan's tears fell from his cheeks. His struggles ceased. Berwald screamed against the gag in his mouth. Natalya turned to him. She had a gleam in her eyes as held a jagged knife to her hand. She pressed the blade to her own flesh and cut a long gash along her palm.

"So, my sweet little nephew, are you ready for your punishment?"

* * *

AN: So...yeah, I killed Ivan...I'm sorry Ivan! And I hate making Natalya the bad guy because I love every single character in Hetalia, but somebody had to be the bad guy and I didn't want an OC for that. Natalya just happened to fit the bill better than anyone else.

Tino will show up in chapter 1 and most of this will be from his point of view because he's the main character, although I will be switching POV a lot throughout the fic. I will try to update as regularly as possible. I have the rough drafts for the first twenty chapters written and it's planned to be twenty-eight chapters long (twenty-nine if you include the prologue). It's going to be loosely based on Beauty and the Beast, Snow White, and Cinderella. There are parallels between this and those fairy tails, but it's not a retelling. There will also be a few gender-bent characters because why not? These will be: Norway, Iceland, England, Japan, and Spain.

Fun fact: Atall (which is the name of the forest in case you forgot) means terrible in Old Norse and eitr means poison (because I'm creative at naming poisons).

Until next time,

~Firewolf


	2. Chapter 1: Quoth the Raven

Hey guys!

I was going to wait until Friday to post this chapter, but it was pretty much ready to be posted anyway, and the reviews from the last chapter got me so excited that I couldn't wait. Seriously, you have no idea how much I was grinning when I got my first review.

Thank you to the people who faved, followed, and reviewed the prologue! I forgot to mention this last time, but thank you to my awesome friend Kitsu Nightspeak who edited the prologue and this chapter. I also forgot to thank my sister, who is my plot-fixer, and without her, this fanfic would not have a climax, a real bad guy, or a title. As you will see in future chapters, I suck at naming things. As I write this note, I am also procrastinating on thinking of a title for this chapter. That's why this note is long. Because I can't think of anything... I'm tempted to give up. I'm just going to name it after the song that inspired this entire fanfic. It has nothing to do with Beauty and the Beast, but whatever.

Enjoy! =D

* * *

Chapter 1—Quoth the Raven

**Tino**

Pain like fire surged through me. I heard myself scream, but it sounded like it was from a distance, like there was someone else yelling in the room. The sound echoed in my head until it became unbearably loud. Everything hurt. Small whispers assaulted my ears. The dim candle light blinded me. Even the fabric of the bed sheets dragged across my skin like sandpaper on wood. I heard Father say something about medicine. I was lifted into a sitting position. My head was tilted back. The bitter taste of some inky black poison filled my mouth and I coughed, but I swallowed most of it.

Very quickly, my whole body became numb. My mind filled with thick cotton. I couldn't feel anything. I couldn't see anything. I couldn't even think. I was so far gone that I could barely remember my own name, not that my name was an important thought at the time. My whole being was focused on rejecting the medicine, with throwing off the paralysis it caused. Being numb was so much worse than the pain. The medicine made me feel like I was already dead. But it wasn't something I could fight. The black veil was draped over my eyes and with the medicine coursing steadily through my veins, I sank into darkness.

Sometime later, I awoke. More pain. But my head was strangely clear for the first time in… a long time. With a clear head, the pain wasn't so unbearable. It was nighttime. I saw snow falling outside my window. When I first got sick, it was winter. I knew that summer had come and gone, so it must have been about a year. I remembered my name. My name was Tino. I was sixteen—no, I was probably seventeen now.

I got out of bed and almost immediately fell over. I gripped the side of my bed and carefully pulled myself into a standing position. I looked down at my body and I had to stop myself from shrieking. I closed my eyes and took a calming breath before looking back down at myself. My eyes had not deceived me. I had been reduced to a frail skeleton. I could count all of my bones. _How could this have happened to me?_

I nearly gave up right there. Between the pain and seeing what I had become, I almost longed for the numbness that the medicine brought. But I had to escape. I would not die here. I refused. So as quietly as I could, I put on whatever clothing was near. There were no shoes in the room, and I would not risk going downstairs to find some, so I made do with multiple layers of socks. I could not believe how the effort of putting on clothes became so difficult for me. I was breathing heavily.

I went to the window and wrestled it open. The room was on the second floor, but I had climbed down from here hundreds of times as a child. The problem was the snow. I hoped I would not freeze to death, but I decided I had nothing to lose. It was either die here or die out there with a fighting chance. Although, given the state my body was in, I didn't have as much of a fighting chance as I had hoped.

Just as I put my foot out the window, I heard my father coming up the stairs to give me more medicine. I panicked and nearly slipped off the side of the house. I managed to regain my footing and I finished my descent, heart pounding in my chest all the while. Just as I touched down on the ground, I saw my father stick his head out the window.

He yelled out to me, but I couldn't hear him. I was already running across the snow as fast as my emaciated legs would carry me. I ran toward the forest. I knew he wouldn't follow me in there. Everyone was always so superstitious about it. They said that the Atall Forest was the domain of some terrible hell-beast. Hundreds of people had seen the Beast over the years; a giant, hairy creature that attacks anyone who enters its home. When Eduard was a child he saw it and told me that he was lucky to have made it out alive. I had no reason not to believe the stories, but with my father behind me, yelling at me to get back inside, I figured I would take my chances with the Beast.

I have no idea how I managed to run for as long as I did. I had never been a good runner, even when I was in perfect health, and now I was running completely on empty. I did not know when I last ate solid food and I couldn't even remember if I had anything to drink that day. I probably had no muscle left. I still felt pain shooting through my veins, but I couldn't stop. Stopping meant death, and I was not ready to accept that yet. The pain was completely overridden by fear.

I don't know how long I ran, but sometime later, maybe minutes, maybe hours, I found myself lying in the snow. I felt so weak. My legs had run as far as they could carry me, but no more. Another jolt of pain arched through my body and I cried out. I sobbed, but no tears ran down my face. I did not want to die there, frozen in the snow, my death having no meaning. I was just a kid! It wasn't fair. I hadn't even lived yet.

I yelled and screamed. It was all I could do, lying on my back, unable to move.

"Help! Please!" I croaked. My voice echoed through the silent trees. My whole body shook, from both the cold and from fear. "Please! Somebody!" I laid there for some time, staring at the stars dotting the velvet night sky. The snow must have stopped falling at some point, since the sky was clear now. The trees towered over me. They rustled and swayed in the cold wind. I felt warmer. I knew that meant I was dying from the cold.

_What am I doing here? I should have stayed home. I should have died in my bed. No one will come out here just to retrieve my body. By running away, I am leaving my sisters to bury an empty casket._

That was when I heard the wolves. I could not see them, but I heard them growling as they approached. I heard their paws crunch through the snow. A twig snapped to my left. They had circled around me.

"Oh god, no," I sobbed when I felt a wet cold nose press against my face. I heard a loud growl and one of them bit my leg. I could feel its teeth through my clothes. I screamed.

_So this is how it all ends. I won't even make a decent meal for a pack of wolves._ I barely had enough energy to scream again as a wolf's face hovered over mine, fangs bared. _Just wait until I'm dead,_ I pleaded silently. _You won't have to wait long._

I felt numbness creep over me as the other wolves closed in. I was faintly aware of a raven cawing and taking flight. _Huh, I wonder what spooked it._

A wolf yelped. And then another. I heard several growls, then for some reason, the entire pack turned tail and fled. I was almost too far gone to care. A dark shadow loomed over me. It was hairy, but strangely human-like.

_So you are the Beast of the forest. I won't make a good meal for you either,_ I thought. Darkness flooded my vision and I was no longer aware of the world.

* * *

Slowly, I drifted up into consciousness. I became aware of voices around me.

"Oh, the poor dear," I heard a woman's voice say. "I wonder what happened to put him in this state." She spoke formally but she had a nice voice. She sounded like she actually cared about me. I was laying on something soft. It felt like a mattress, only it was much more comfortable than any mattress I had ever laid on. I shifted a little. "Oh, look Master! He is stirring. Wait Master! Where are you going?"

I noticed that for the first time I was neither in pain nor was I numb. I was just there. It was a strange feeling but it felt good. I stretched a little. My eyes fluttered open. I was in an unfamiliar room. It was much nicer than any room I had ever seen before. The walls were painted a deep blue and gold and it was decorated with expensive furniture. Bright sunlight streamed through a window to my right. _Did I somehow stumble into a castle?_

I realized that I was lying in a bed fit for a king. It was certainly not filled with straw like the mattresses I was used to. And the super soft sheets on the bed were probably worth more than my house.

I looked up to see two women standing by the bed. One of them, a blonde wearing her hair in pigtails with a handkerchief covering her head, bent over me.

"How are you feeling, dearie?" she asked. I realized that she was the woman who spoke earlier.

"Better," I answered her, my voice coming out in a horrible croak. "Thank you."

"Oh, don't thank me, sweet. It was Master Berwald who did all the work. He found you out in the snow being attacked by wolves! He carried you in here and fixed up your leg," she told me. "You'll have a nasty scar there, but don't you fret, it'll heal well enough. Also, you seemed to be ill with some horrid sort of ailment, so Master Berwald cured you of it."

"He cured me?" I asked. The woman nodded. "So that's why I don't hurt anymore."

"Yes," she said. "You seemed to be in a lot of pain. Now, when was the last time you ate, dearie? You look like you haven't eaten in days!"

I shrugged. "I don't really remember," I told her.

"Let's give you something light to eat first," she said. She turned to the other woman. "Elizabeta, can you get some broth and bread?"

The other woman, a brunette who was also wearing a white handkerchief over her head, nodded and hurried out of the room. She came back a few moments later with a steaming bowl and two rolls of bread. It smelled so good I thought I had died and gone to heaven.

The blonde woman propped me up against a couple of pillows and Elizabeta held a spoonful of the broth up to my lips. I reached for the bowl.

"Can you hold it on your own?" she asked, looking doubtfully at me, but she gave me the bowl when I nodded. I gulped down all of its contents so quickly I burnt my tongue, but it tasted so good I didn't care.

"Careful! You'll make yourself sick if you eat too quickly," Elizabeta said. I was already devouring the second roll before I slowed down. I was so hungry I didn't care if I got sick. Elizabeta watched me with amusement.

"Thank you so much," I said when I was done. Elizabeta took the bowl and put it on a tray to take away later. I felt bad that these women had to wait upon me.

"It's no problem, sweet," the blonde woman said. "It's good that you have an appetite. You'll get back on your feet faster that way."

"Where is um… Master Berwald?" I asked. I hoped I had remembered the name of my savior correctly. "I want to thank him for saving my life." Elizabeta and the blonde woman exchanged a look.

"Master Berwald is working on some other business, but I will make sure he comes by to check on you," the blonde said.

"Okay, thank you," I said. With my stomach full for the first time in quite a while, I was starting to feel sleepy. My eyelids started to droop, but I wanted to keep talking. "By the way, my name is Tino. What's your name?"

The blonde smiled. "I am Alice and this is Elizabeta."

"It's good to meet you both," I said. "Where am I?"

"You are in Master Berwald's castle in the Atall Forest," Alice told me.

My eyes widened. "I didn't know there was a castle out here! Everyone always said that no one was allowed to build in the forest because anyone who did would get eaten by the Beast."

Alice laughed. "Those are just old wives' tales. I can tell you that there is no man-eating beast in these woods. Unless you get caught by the wolves."

"Yeah, I think I figured that out last night," I said. I didn't mention to them that I remembered something distinctly beast-like coming upon me last night as the wolves attacked. I stifled a yawn.

"Well, Mister Tino," she said. "I know that we are all dying to hear your story, especially after the ruckus last night, but I think you should get some more sleep before you tell us."

She started tucking the blankets in around me. "If you need anything, just grab this string." She pointed to a blue rope with a gold tassel hanging next to the bed. "That will ring for one of us, okay?"

I nodded, already falling asleep in the warm blankets. "Sleep tight, dearie," she said. As she and Elizabeta walked away, I peeked out from the covers. At the time, I thought I was just overly tired and was seeing things, but I could have sworn that instead of feet, Elizabeta had furry goat legs and cloven hooves. _Huh, that's weird,_ my tired mind thought, as I drifted off into dreamland.

* * *

**Alice**

"Master Berwald," I said. "The boy has fallen asleep. He said he would like to meet you."

_Did you find out anything about him?_ Berwald wrote.

"His name is Tino. And he seems like a very kind, polite boy. I didn't want to pry when he seemed barely able to stay awake. I didn't ask what he was doing out in the forest at night. I did tell him that you cured him, but I don't know if he knows that he was being poisoned." I shook my head. "Poor boy. What kind of poison was it anyway?"

_Poison from the eitr plant,_ he wrote.

My eyes widened. "Eitr?" As a sorceress myself, I knew well that the rare plant was used exclusively for black magic.

_He seems to have been exposed to it over a long period of time. That would be the only explanation for how he could have three times the amount it takes to kill a human in his veins, and still be alive. It could also explain why he is so emaciated. If he has been exposed to it for a long time, then it has been making him too sick to eat or drink._

I sighed. "The poor dear can barely sit up on his own. I wonder who could have done this to such a sweet child." Berwald's fist clenched and he had a hard look in his eyes. "Master, just out of curiosity, do you know who might have done this?" I asked. I saw fear in his eyes as well.

_I've only ever known of one sorcerer who uses eitr to kill. I have long feared that she may have found a way to stay alive all these years. This may not have anything to do with her, but I won't take that chance. _

"You think it might be Natalya," I whispered. He nodded. The very mention of that woman's name sent a sick feeling through my gut.

_One of eitr's properties is that it can be used to extract the life out of a person. I fear that she might have been using it to feed off of this boy's life. __I won't let her kill this child if that is her wish. The boy will be protected._

"But... why would Natalya target him?"

_I don't know. I don't pretend to understand the inner workings of a lunatic's mind. She could have simply picked a victim at random. Or Tino might have a connection with someone whom she wants to hurt. Or she might not be involved with this at all. She could be dead, for all I know._

Though he said that, I knew he didn't believe it. The bitch was far too tenacious to just lay down and die and we both knew it. Natalya would have figured out how to survive one way or another. "Will Tino be able to recover from this?"

Berwald shrugged. _At this point, it's hard to know how much damage has been done to his internal organs, but I know it is severe. Even if you survive being poisoned by eitr, the long term effects are immense. His chances of surviving more than another five years are grim._

I gasped. "He only has five more years to live! But he is just a child! Isn't there anything that can help him?"

_There is only one way to repair damage that is this extensive, and I would only use that method if he were fully informed of what would happen to him._

"You mean you'd have to make him immortal?"

_Yes._

* * *

**Tino**

When I woke up, Alice was in the room carrying a tray of food.

"Oh good, you're awake," she said. She set the tray down and helped me sit up. She handed me a cup filled with some strange, blue liquid. "Master Berwald said that you should drink this. It should help you get your strength back and help you gain some weight, which you desperately need."

I hesitantly took a sip from the cup and nearly spit it back out. Ugh, it tasted like cold, black coffee. I made a face and Alice laughed. "Just drink it love, you'll feel better. Most potions taste nasty, and I can tell you from experience that that's one of the better tasting ones."

I decided to just get it over with and chug the whole thing. I held my nose as I gulped the foul liquid down. Alice handed me a bowl filled with soup. "Here, this should help get the taste out."

"Thanks," I said, taking a bite. I noticed that I felt better almost immediately. I wasn't struggling to stay awake and sitting up was much easier. "Wow," I said. "Even though that stuff tastes nasty, I actually feel great right now. I take it that Master Berwald isn't some quack sorcerer."

Alice shook her head. "No, Master Berwald certainly is the real thing. He is very good at what he does. His father, Master Ivan, came from a long line of sorcerers, and his grandfather, his mother's father, the late Master Berwald, was supposedly one of the greatest sorcerers who ever lived. Now, I've never met the Master's grandfather, but I'd be willing to wager that our Berwald is a much better sorcerer than he."

I imagined Master Berwald as a short old man with a long, scraggly gray beard and a tiny pair of pince-nez on a big hooked nose. In my head, he was kind and very serious, but he had an extravagant taste in clothing and wore brightly colored cloaks all the time, even around his house. Maybe that's just what I thought all sorcerers were like.

"He sounds like a great man. Is he still busy? I would love to thank him for his kindness." I had been here in the castle for about five days now and I still had not met my mysterious savior. Alice always said he was busy.

I was certain that Master Berwald had saved me from the Beast. I remembered that a great, hairy creature scared away the wolves that night—_Wait! What if Master Berwald is the Beast's master?! What if he controls the Beast and uses it as a guard dog to keep wandering villagers from trespassing on his property?!_ Actually, that made a lot of sense. I decided that when I finally met Master Berwald, I would ask him about it.

"I'm afraid he is busy still," she said. "He does check up on you when he has time, but you are always asleep."

"I wouldn't mind if he woke me," I told her. Honestly, I was pretty sure he was not always busy like Alice said and I suspected that something else was going on here.

* * *

**Alice**

"You know if you wish to protect him, he will have to see you eventually. If he ends up living here, you will have to show him your face. He has been here for nearly a week now and he asks to thank you in person every day. You can't keep avoiding him."

_I'm sure I will figure something out._

I shook my head. "Master, he may be an outsider, but that doesn't mean he can't accept you for who you are. He already knows you are a good person because you saved his life. I'm sure he can look beyond your appearance. Every one of us here knows you are good, no matter how scary you look. Your problem is that you have no self-esteem," I admonished.

_Yes, but all of you suffer the same curse as me, so it's only natural that you'd accept me._

"Alfred, Matthew, Hong, and Sakura are not cursed and they accept you," I argued.

_Hong knew me before it happened, and Alfred and Matthew grew up in my presence, so it's only natural that they aren't afraid of me,_ he countered. _And Sakura is strange._

I couldn't deny the bit about Sakura. She was the one person to see Berwald's face and have absolutely no reaction. But that's beside the point. He needs to be more sociable. "Oh Master, what am I to do with you? I don't understand why you are so stubborn about this. So will you meet with the boy or not?"

_I plan to avoid frightening him for as long as possible._

I sighed. "Well, I can't force you to do anything. But please consider it. I think this boy may end up being good for you."

_How so?_

"He might help to bring you out of your shell," I said. "Just because you scared the hell out of a group of villagers that one time does not mean that every outside person you meet will automatically be afraid of you."

_It wasn't just that one time, Alice. I've scared away hundreds of people over the years. I don't want to scare him away too._

"You won't scare him away," I told him. "You saved his life."

_I won't meet with him._

I fumed a little. He could be so stubborn. "Mark my words Master Berwald, someday you will meet Tino face to face. I will make it happen." And with that, I left the office

* * *

And thus, the plot thickens. Daww, Berwald is shy!

If you bothered to read my ramblings in the top author's note, then you might be wondering about the song that inspired this fanfic. It's called 'Quoth the Raven' by Eluveitie. You can watch it here: www. youtube watch?v= g8eeKDDWeRg. The scene where the wolves are closing in on Tino and the raven gets spooked was the first thing I wrote of this story, and I wrote it while listening to that song.

Anyway, let me know what you think! Take a guess about what happened to Tino.

Until next time,

~Firewolf


	3. Chapter 2: Tino's Story

Happy Friday wonderful reviewers, favers, and followers! Yay, another lame chapter title!

Just so you know, from here on out I will be up dating every Friday unless I let you know before hand. I already know which chapters will take me longer than a week to write (I'm looking at you chapter 12, you pain in the neck!). Also I may or may not be late during finals week. It depends on how much I decide to procrastinate on studying for my statistics exam. Lots of procrastination = fast update.

FYI, in this chapter, Tino talks about his sisters. His older sister Nora is fem!Norway and his younger sister Emilia is fem!Iceland. Just wanted to clarify that so no one gets confused. I have quite a few genderbent characters in this story just for the sake of realism. I know that this is fantasy, but it would be ridiculous if every single pairing was gay without an adequate explanation.

Enjoy! =D

* * *

Chapter 2—Tino's Story

**Tino**

It was after dinner and Alice was helping me bathe. I still couldn't stand on my own yet, so Alice had to carry me to the bathroom. The bathroom in my room was as enormous as it was beautiful and I was a bit bewildered by it. It looked more like a place to pray rather than a place to poop. Seriously, it was nicer than my town's temple. It was covered in tiles of white marble, and the walls were crowned with ornately carved wood. It actually had plumbing and by twisting a certain knob, Alice made hot water pour into the bathtub. She set me down on the edge of the tub and helped me remove my clothes and the bandage on my leg.

"This is healing quite nicely," she said, inspecting the wound. It was scabbed over and to me it looked really icky, but I trusted Alice's eyes.

"Do you think I'll have a cool-looking scar when it's healed?" I joked.

She grinned. "I would think so." She picked me up bridal-style and lowered me into the warm water. I sighed in contentment. It felt so nice to sit in a hot bath like this.

"I feel so spoiled," I told her. "Back in town if you wanted to take a bath, you either had to wash yourself with well water, which was cold as hell, or you had to go to the public bath house, which was always filled with old men who only talked about their bowels." She chuckled.

"What? You don't like hearing about the bowel movements of old men, Tino?" she teased.

"Ewww," I said, sticking my tongue out and making a face. Alice laughed. She poured girly, flower-scented shampoo onto a wash cloth and began lathering up my hair. While Alice washed my hair I was silent. I wanted to ask her again about meeting Master Berwald, but I didn't want to annoy the living hell out of her. I could tell that I was wearing on her patience. But I couldn't help it.

"Hey Alice," I started.

"Hm?"

I sighed. "I don't want to keep bothering you about this, but I've been here a full week now and I still haven't met Master Berwald."

She paused before answering. "You will meet him eventually. Like I have said before, he is quite a busy man—"

"There's something else going on, isn't there?" I interrupted. I turned around to look at Alice's face. She threw the washcloth down and pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration. For a second, I was worried that I had offended her but then she said:

"He is just the most stubborn, infuriating man who ever lived," she said. "And yes, he has his reasons, but anytime someone new comes to the castle, he keeps himself holed up in his room until they leave and he refuses to meet them. It's nothing personal Tino, he's just—well, shy isn't the right word. I don't know. No matter what I do, the man won't budge."

"Why?" I asked.

She sighed. "It is a long story, but Master Berwald doesn't look…normal. He is embarrassed by his appearance, and with good reason. Anyone would end up with serious, deep-seated self-esteem issues if people ran away at the very sight of them. He just doesn't want to frighten you."

"That's so sad!" I cried. "He saved my life, gave me shelter under his roof, and he won't see me because he's afraid I might reject him! How mean have people been to him?"

She sighed. "People haven't necessarily been mean to him Tino," she said. "Master Berwald likes going for strolls around the forest in the evenings. Occasionally local villagers get lost, find themselves close to the castle, and they see him. When a person sees something in the woods that looks like a monster, they don't sit down with it and have a nice chat over tea. They run away screaming. In any other case, that would be the smart thing to do since real monsters have a tendency to snack on human faces. Obviously, Master Berwald is not a real monster, but you couldn't tell the difference from his appearance."

I gasped as realization set in. "Alice, is Master Berwald the Beast?"

She bit her lip. "Many have called him that," she admitted.

"So that night, when the wolves were scared away, I was saved by the Beast?" I gave a small laugh. "You know, if I told anyone that, they'd never believe me." Then a thought occurred to me. "Wait, if Master Berwald is the Beast, then what happened to all those people who went into the forest and never returned?"

She shrugged. "Most people who come through here are runaways. We usually provide them with food and shelter for a few days, and then my nephew Hong leads them out of the forest."

"Oh. So no one has actually been killed by the Beast. People just assume that because there is a 'monster' in the forest, it eats everybody who comes through here."

Alice nodded. "That's the gist of it."

"That sucks," I said. "If I promise not to freak out, can I meet him? I think I'm mentally prepared to see him."

Alice sighed. "Unfortunately, that decision is entirely up to him."

I pouted. Alice picked up the wash cloth and finished washing my hair. She handed me a bar of soap.

"Think you can handle washing yourself?" she asked.

I smiled and took the bar from her, cheering up a little bit. Every day Alice let me do something new on my own. The first couple days I was here, I wasn't even strong enough to sit up. Now I was able to wash myself. I scrubbed my skin, glad that I had regained enough muscle to do this.

The nasty tasting blue potion that Master Berwald made helped a lot. While I was a long way off from a healthy weight, I didn't look quite like a nightmare skeleton anymore. I could still count all of my ribs and my cheeks were hollow, but at least my legs and arms didn't look like twigs anymore. Yes, they had been promoted to 'sticks.'

"So," Alice began, starting up another conversation as she picked me up out of the tub and dried me off. "Master Berwald has been wondering what exactly happened to you."

"Oh well—" I was about to answer and tell her everything, but then an evil thought popped into my head. "Actually, if you don't mind, Alice, I'd like to tell Master Berwald that myself."

Alice grinned, catching on. "I like your style, dearie. Shall I tell him?"

"By all means," I said.

"Are you able to read?" she asked as she finished dressing me. She set me on the bed.

"Yes," I said. "Why?"

"Master Berwald is unable to speak, so he has to write everything down."

"Oh." I thought about that for a moment. "Wait, if he can't speak, how can he do spells?"

"He is talented enough that he can just think the spell in his head and the spell will work."

"Wow. I mean, I don't know much about sorcery, but I know that's impressive." I had learned from my sister that words helped to guide the magical flow or something like that. She told me that mispronouncing a word in the magical language could make a spell go haywire, so sorcerers spend a great deal of time making sure every word is pronounced exactly right. But I had never heard of anyone able to perform sorcery without a saying spells out loud.

"He is very good at what he does," she said. "Wait here. I'll see if I can fetch him."

She walked out of the room, leaving me to twiddle my thumbs in silence. When a couple of minutes had passed, I started to worry that I had offended him, but then Alice poked her head back in the room shortly after.

"He says, 'Please don't scream.'"

"Okay," I replied. My heart pounded in anticipation. I was so excited to finally meet my savior face to face. She opened the door and pulled in what was possibly the largest creature I had ever seen in my life. It—no, he—was enormous. He was large all around, not fat, but broad and muscular, and very tall. He had to be at least six and a half feet tall, for he had to duck underneath the doorway. There was no way I could have screamed. My mouth just hung open awkwardly at the sight of him.

If I had run into the man in a dark alley in the middle of the night, I probably would have wet myself, but seeing him in the daylight, he wasn't that scary. Impressive, yes; terrifying hell-beast, no. In fact, I was a little disappointed at his lack of pants-wetting inducing terror. The Beast has always been described to me as some big, hairy troll-like creature that had mangy, matted fur, giant razor sharp teeth, and enormous claws. Eduard once told me that the Beast had huge, spiraling devil horns coming out of its head and that it breathed fire. He said that it walked with a slow, creeping gait and it dragged its knuckles on the ground.

Master Berwald looked nothing like that. He stood upright, like a man, and retained a mostly human body shape, but his head was that of a lion's. Two soft, pointed ears sat atop his head, twitching a little, like a cat's ears. He had long, pearly-white teeth extending from his mouth, and a beautiful golden mane. His hair was perfectly clean and well-manicured. He gave off an air of being very well groomed.

His eyes were human. Intense blue eyes, that sat behind a pair of glasses, gazed at me with curiosity and, oddly enough, a hint of fear. His entire body was tense and I was sure that if I said something wrong, he would bolt from the room.

"Y-you are Master Berwald?" I asked, internally scolding myself for stuttering. I didn't want to give him the impression that I was scared. He nodded. "I'm so happy to finally meet you!" I gave him a huge grin. He seemed to relax at this and his upper lip twitched in what I assumed was a smile. "I wanted to thank you for saving my life. I don't know how I can ever repay you."

He took a hesitant step forward, approaching the bed with caution. He pulled out a pad of paper. He quickly wrote something on it with surprisingly human hands and handed it to me. I was shocked at how neat the man's penmanship was. He wrote in a beautiful, looping script that was very easy to read.

It said: _Thank you for not screaming. I don't like it when that happens._

I laughed and handed the notepad back to him. "Actually, with the way everyone talks about you, I was expecting you to look scarier."

He looked relieved and wrote something on the pad._ I am glad to see that you are feeling better. You look like you have regained some strength._

"I am feeling much better. That blue stuff tasted nasty, but it worked really well. I can sit up on my own now and Alice let me wash myself tonight," I told him excitedly.

He did the lip twitch thing again. _You will probably have to get used to the taste of that potion if you want to get your strength back. _

I sighed. "I figured that would be the case. But if I can get back to normal, it'll be worth it."

He nodded. _I have to ask you some questions._

"Ask me anything," I told him.

_Were you aware that your illness was due to poison?_

I bit my lip and nodded. "Yes, I knew that."

_Could you tell me who was poisoning you?_

I took a deep breath. "M-my father." His eyes widened in shock and Alice gasped. She and Master Berwald exchange a glance. He pulled a chair over and sat in it. Alice sat at the end of the bed.

_Does your father have anything to do with a woman named Natalya?_

I shook my head. "I don't think so. I have no idea who that is at the very least."

His eyes narrowed in concentration. _Does your father happen to be a sorcerer?_

I almost laughed at that. "No, not at all. He believes it's the devil's craft. He threw my grandmother out of the house when she started teaching my older sister sorcery."

Master Berwald scratched his head. _Do you know where he obtained the poison?_

"He grew it in the garden. It came from this green fern plant he got a couple years ago while trading in the East. My father's a merchant, by the way. He bought it because it's a good way to protect vegetables from getting eaten by rodents. We had a pretty bad raccoon problem at the time, but after he planted it, the raccoons started dying off. I guess he figured that it was a good way to get rid of me too."

Berwald looked at me with compassion and I felt comforted by the sadness in his eyes. Alice, on the other hand, had a horrified look on her face. "That man is a monster!" she spat. I couldn't help but agree with her.

_Why did he want to kill you?_

I bit my lip. I really didn't want to tell them. I knew that even people as wonderful as Alice and Master Berwald couldn't accept this part of me, but he saved my life and he let me see his face even though he feared my rejection, so I figured that I owed him pretty much anything he asked of me.

"Well, you see," I began. I bit my lip again and swallowed my fear. "I am attracted to men." I flinched, expecting them to throw me out immediately, but Master Berwald and Alice didn't look disgusted at all. They only looked concerned. I was confused by this. Who were these people? They owed me nothing. They weren't my family and I was so deeply indebted to them, I would probably never be able to repay them. And yet, when told my darkest secret, they looked at me with such kind, caring eyes. I doubted that even my own mother would have been as accepting as this. Master Berwald placed a warm, comforting hand on my arm and Alice even hugged me.

"Oh sweetie," she said. "It's okay, you're safe with us. You can tell us anything."

Tears sprang to my eyes and I sniffled a little. Hell, I didn't even get this kind of glowing acceptance from my sisters. I tried wiping my face with my hand but the tears continued to fall. Berwald pulled out a handkerchief and dried my eyes.

"Th-thank you," I choked out. "Thank you."

Berwald ruffled my hair as if to say '_it's not a problem_' and he gave me another smile.

_How did your father find out?_ he asked.

I pulled myself together before speaking. "I-it was a year ago in early autumn," I said. "About a month before I got 'sick,' I was in a relationship with Eduard, the mayor's son. I had been in a couple of secret relationships already and I thought I could hide my... desires forever. But… my father happened to come across us kissing one day. We were in the horse stable and I have no idea why he walked in there in the first place, but he found us. He was so angry that he punched me right there in front of Eduard. He dragged me home and his grip around my wrist was so hard that it left bruises. I had never seen him that angry before in my life. He told me that I was disgusting and that I was not his son anymore."

I paused and looked at Berwald and Alice to gauge their emotions. Berwald's eyes were sympathetic and Alice looked enraged. Berwald motioned for me to keep talking.

"H-he gave me the worst beating of my life that night. After that, he ignored me entirely. He actually set my chair at the dinner table on fire. He didn't let me eat with the family either. He pretended that I didn't exist. No matter what my sisters did, they couldn't get him to forgive me. Then one day, out of the blue, I collapsed. I think he slipped the poison into my food. Nora, my older sister, found me in the garden. Father had me quarantined in the upstairs bedroom and only let my sisters see me when the poisoned had numbed me. I knew that he was trying to kill me, but the poison was so strong that I couldn't tell anyone. And no one suspected him. He acted like he was so upset over my 'illness.' He put on a good show for my sisters and for all the well-wishers." I laughed bitterly. "I should have seen it coming. He put on the same show when Mom was dying."

_Did he kill your mother too?_ Berwald asked.

I sighed heavily and nodded. "I have no idea why he killed her, but she died the same exact way that I would have, so I'm certain he did it. Nora and I thought that his mourning was too over the top, but we thought that he didn't want to appear uncaring to the rest of the town. He never seemed to love Mom before. Their marriage was arranged and there was no love lost between them. It was really weird seeing him act like he cared, but we never would have guessed that he killed her. We knew that he didn't love Mom, or like her for that matter, but we never thought he would go so far as to murder her. But now I am certain he did it."

"It sounds like even if your father wasn't homicidal, he wouldn't be a kind man," Alice observed.

I nodded. "He was a firm believer in crushing everyone who opposed him. He was the 'man of the house' and everything had to be exactly as he wanted it. If my mom, my sisters, or I acted in a way he didn't like, to him it was like we were purposely defying him. He considered every little offense to be an attempt to undermine his authority. I remember that Mom accidentally dropped a pot of soup on the floor and he punished her by holding her hand down on the hot stove. Once, he beat Nora black and blue when he caught the two of us swordfighting with a pair of brooms. He said it wasn't lady-like of her. I don't think he ever beat my younger sister Emilia, though, since she's his little princess. One time, he whipped me and Nora so bad that we couldn't sit down for two days because we were teasing Emilia and we made her cry. He beat me at random times because he thought it would make me manlier. I never was manly enough for him."

_You should stay here, _Berwald wrote._ You will be safe with us._

My eyes widened. How could he be so kind? It would have been enough if had just saved me from the wolves. But he had given me a room to sleep in and he had rid me of the poison that was killing me. He gave me food to eat and medicine to help me recover. And now he was giving me the option of living in his house? Even after I told him I was attracted to men?

Tears brimmed in my eyes and a lump formed in my throat. Before I could stop it, I was crying again. Alice hugged me.

"You are such a sweet, polite little thing," she said. "How could we ever turn you away? I am right, Master?" Berwald nodded and gave me his approximation of a comforting smile. "Plus, it has been a while since I've been able to spoil someone. My sons are all grown up now and neither of them responds well to my babying them, although, no matter how old they get, they will always be my precious babies. You remind me a lot of my oldest boy, Matthew. He was always such a kind boy, though a bit more timid than you, but he is very respectful. He's not at all like my younger son, Alfred. My little Alfie was a rebel from the moment he was born. He was such a cute thing as a child, being his independent little self, but when he hit his teenage years he became impossible to reason with. He insisted that he was all grown up and could make decisions for himself." Alice shook her head.

From the bored look on Berwald's face, I assumed that it was normal for Alice to ramble on and on about her children. I laughed. "Alfred sounds a lot like my little sister Emilia. She hates it when people treat her like a child. She's only fourteen, but she likes to pretend that she's an adult."

"It must be a younger sibling thing," Alice observed.

"Yeah, I guess so," I said. Then a thought occurred to me. "Hey Alice, how old are you? You don't look old enough to have adult children." She looked like she might be in her early thirties at the most.

"Oh, thank you dearie. I am actually much older than I look," she said. "It's a long story."

"Could you tell me?"

She and Berwald exchanged a glance. "I believe that is a story Master Berwald should tell."

"Does it have something to do with why you look like a lion?" I asked him. He nodded.

_It is a long story,_ he wrote. _I can write it out for you tonight, if you wish to know._

"I am very interested, but I don't want you to go to too much trouble for me."

_It is not a problem. For me, writing is as easy as speaking, but it is a long story and I'd like to have it prepared in advance. Since you will be here for a while, I believe it is necessary that you know._

"If it isn't a problem, then I'd love to hear, or read it."

_I will bring it to you in the morning._

"Okay," I said. "Although I'm really curious and I probably won't be able to get to sleep now."

He gave me a smile and Alice gave him a weird look.

"Alright dearie," she said. "I suppose you should be getting to bed. It is getting late." I looked out the window, and saw the clouds turning a dark blue-gray with the setting sun.

"I didn't even realize it was that late already," I said. "How long have we been talking?"

"Quite a while now," she said. She quickly tucked me in under the covers. "Are you comfy, dearie?"

"Yes, thank you." I was a little bit confused though. Why was Alice suddenly in such a rush to leave?

"It's not a problem, sweet," she said, cupping my cheek. "I will bring you breakfast in the morning, but in the meantime if you need anything, just ring that bell." She kissed my forehead and walked to the door. "Master Berwald, will you still take your evening tea in your bedroom?" Berwald nodded and she left the room in a hurry. Berwald stood from his chair. He also looked confused at Alice's quick departure. He shook his head.

"Master Berwald," I said. He turned to me. "Thank you, for everything. I've never been treated with so much kindness before. It was a pleasure to meet you." He scribbled something on his notepad.

_The pleasure was all mine, Tino. Sleep well. I will see you in the morning._

"You too. Good night," I said. And with that, he left the room.

My mind wandered for a while. I wondered what I would learn about my host come morning. _What had befallen this great man? Was it some sort of sorcery accident? Or had someone done that to him? _

I thought about what everyone in my town said about the 'hell-beast' that lived in the forest. The stories said if you became lost in the forest, the beast would find you and kill you for entering his domain. Master Berwald was definitely not the monster everyone talked about. If anything, he was more like a misunderstood hero from one of Emilia's romance novels. I smiled a little at the thought. If anyone deserved to live happily ever after, it was him.

At some point after the sun had fallen below the horizon, I fell asleep with these thoughts still circling in my head.

* * *

**Alice**

I hurried down to the kitchen where I knew Elizabeta would be. As I prepared Berwald's tea, I chatted with her about Tino.

"His father was poisoning him?" she asked. "No way!"

"It's true," I said, as I set a pot of water on the stove to boil. I could have boiled the water with magic, but I wanted to have time to gossip. "Can you get the tea leaves from the pantry?" Elizabeta hurried off to the small room.

"Why did he do it?" she asked, her voice muffled by the walls.

"Because Tino likes men and apparently that wasn't acceptable to his father." She handed me the tea box. "Thank you."

"Tino likes men?" she asked, leaning on the counter. Her left eyebrow was raised, meaning she was planning something.

"Eliza, you have that scheming look on your face again."

"Maybe because I am scheming," she said, grinning. "You think Berwald's interested in him?"

I snorted. "Oh, without a doubt. He smiled at the boy. _Four_ _times_."

Elizabeta's mouth dropped. "My god. I don't even _remember_ the last time I saw him smile."

"It was seven years ago," I told her. "Gilbert pissed Matthew off and Matthew dumped a bowl of mashed potatoes on his head. It was funny enough for him to crack a smile."

"And he smiled at Tino four times in one day?!"

I nodded. "The master just can't resist those pretty violet eyes," I said.

Elizabeta laughed. "Well, Tino does have some gorgeous eyes. They are like amethysts. Not to mention that once he gains some weight, he will be absolutely adorable. Berwald will certainly pursue him."

"One problem," I said. "We need to make sure that Tino likes him back."

"Alice, Tino practically _begged_ you to let him meet Berwald. There has to be something there."

"Wanting to thank the man who saved your life is different from pining after him. If we plan to encourage Berwald to go after Tino, we have to make sure Berwald's feelings are returned."

Elizabeta sighed. "I suppose you are right."

"Of course I'm right," I said. The water in the tea kettle started to boil. I put the pot on the tray with a tea cup. "I'll talk to you later Eliza." I picked up the tray and walked out of the kitchen.

"See you later Alice!" she said.

As I walked to Berwald's room, I wondered if Tino could fall for Berwald. He was so young, but he didn't seem shallow. Perhaps he could fall for Berwald even if he was in that form. He seemed to be genuinely interested in Berwald as a person. Maybe Elizabeta and I should just wait and see how things would play out between them.

I opened the door to Berwald's room. "Master Berwald, I have your tea," I announced. He waved me in. I set the tray in a clear space on his desk and poured a cup for him. "Now that wasn't so bad was it?" I asked, referring to his meeting with Tino.

_If you say 'I told you so,' I will turn you into a rabbit. _

I chuckled. "Tino is a sweet boy, isn't he?" Berwald nodded. "What did you think of him?" He took a sip of his tea, holding the cup with his right hand, and writing with his left.

_I like him. If he had turned out to be a little shit, I wouldn't have offered to let him stay. He seems to be a genuinely kind boy. Perhaps a bit quirky, but kind._

"I'm glad you offered to let him live here even though this has nothing to do with Natalya." I said.

Berwald shrugged. _He needs a place to live, regardless of who poisoned him. He doesn't have anywhere to go and he'd be persecuted no matter where he went. At least he will be accepted here. And we can give him a job working with Hong, Alfred, Matthew, and Sakura. He said that his father was a merchant so he might know something about trading. _

I nodded. "That's true," I said, but I noticed that there was a hesitant look in Berwald's eyes. "You still think that Natalya is connected somehow, don't you."

_I don't have enough evidence to rule out the possibility. Even if Natalya simply gave eitr seeds to the man who sold the plant to Tino's father, that is still a connection. I won't make the mistake of assuming she has nothing to do with this._

I sighed. "Don't get too paranoid, okay? I don't want you obsessing over the phantom of a woman who may not even be alive."

_I won't. I just can't shake the feeling that she is connected somehow. _

He shook his head and added, _Maybe I am being paranoid. Between the fact that Tino was poisoned by eitr and that I'm writing my life story right now, she is stuck in the forefront of my mind._

"Plus, you look exhausted. When was the last time you slept?"

_Last night._

I raised an eyebrow. "And what time did you go to bed?"

_Six a.m.,_ he answered.

"Oh really? Well, drink your tea and then it's off to bed with you, Young Master." I giggled at the scandalized face he gave me.

_What are you, my mother? I'm a grown man. I can go to bed at any time I want._

I gave him the 'Mom' look I always gave to Matthew and Alfred when they were kids. His will crumpled under it.

_But I need to finish writing this,_ he protested.

"No excuses, Mister. Off to bed. If you get to sleep early you can get up and finish it in the morning."

_Fine_, he wrote, drinking the last of his tea. He got up from his desk. I patted his head when he grabbed his night clothes from his dresser. He growled at me. Not seriously of course. He knew I was just playing with him.

"Sweet dreams, Master Berwald," I said as I closed his door. I sighed. I missed those simple days when Berwald was a kid and it was my job to dress him and make sure he brushed his teeth. Even back then, he was adamant about wanting to stay up late. But that time was long gone. He was a man now. Hell, he'd been a man for about two hundred years.

* * *

Lol, Alice is everyone's mother. Seriously, when I was planning this fic, that's what I put for her character description, 'everyone's mother.' And yes, Alice is a hell of a lot older than she looks.

Stay tuned, because next week we will be finding out exactly what happened after the cliffhanger from the prologue.

Please review,

~Firewolf


	4. Chapter 3: Hold Onto Me

Hello again everyone! These chapters keep getting longer and longer. Today I bring you this 8,000+ word monster. No matter what I did, I couldn't get it under 8,000 words, and that was after deleting five pages of unnecessary dialogue. Whatever. A lot of important stuff happens and shit needed explaining. I was planning on calling it 'Berwald Explains Everything. Seriously, Everything' but that was a bit too literal.

Anyway, enjoy =D

* * *

Chapter 3—Hold Onto Me

**Tino**

_Tap, tap, tap._ I grumbled and shifted in my bed.

_Tap, tap, tap._ I pulled the covers over my head, trying to block out the sound of tree branches tapping on my window.

_Tap, tap, tap, tap. _I groaned. Stupid trees. Didn't they know I was trying to sleep?

_Crash._ I gasped at the sound of glass breaking. My heart jumped into my throat. _Calm down Tino. It's nothing. The trees probably just broke the window. Yeah, that's it. It's nothing to worry about. Just trees. _My eyelids flew open. _Wait! How can tree branches break a window?_

A cold draft breezed over the crown of my head. My breathing quickened. I slowly pulled the covers down, peeking into the dark room.

There, standing in front of the shattered window, was a slim, dark figure, outlined by the faint moonlight. I couldn't see its face but I knew that it was looking right at me. Then it moved. It didn't walk, it slowly floated toward me.

I screamed.

It was not bothered at all by the noise I made and continued its slow approach. I scrambled out of bed and immediately fell to the floor. I tried crawling toward the door but the dark figure floated around the bed, blocking my exit. I crawled away as fast as I could and continued screaming.

"Help! Help me!" I cried as I crawled into the bathroom. I slammed the door shut but it stuck its hand in the way. The magic lamps in the bathroom turned on and I was able to see the fingers wrapped around the edge of the door. It had the decaying hand of a corpse. For the first time, I realized that I could smell it. Rotting meat. I gagged. But this was no time to get sick. I had to keep this thing away from me. I hoped that by pushing harder on the door, the thing would pull its hand out, but it seemed to be immune to pain. I think I just made it angry.

It pushed open the door little by little and I was helpless to stop it. It put its entire arm through the door, then its leg, and then it stuck its grotesque head in. Its face was rotting. It had decaying, milky white eyes and in some places the bone was exposed.

It forced the door open and, knowing I had lost, I scrabbled back into a far corner of the bathroom. I screamed again when I saw that behind the thing, more dark figures had come in through the window. I cried and the tears blurred the horrible fiends from my vision.

"P-please, no," I begged. They approached slowly. I counted eight of them. They crowded into the bathroom and stuck their rotting faces in front of mine, making a creepy hissing nose. I began to feel very weak and I slumped onto the floor. A glowing, sky blue light emanated from my body and flowed into their mouths. I couldn't fight them. I had no idea what was happening, but I was pretty sure they were feeding off of something inside of me. I tried to scream again but no sound came out.

Then I heard a roar so loud that it shook me down to my core. I shivered. Oh god, what was that? Would everyone else be okay? The dark things continued to eat the blue light. It was becoming harder and harder to breathe. _Somebody, help me!_

A beautiful golden light filled the room and before my very eyes, the rotting things dissolved into thin air.

Instantly I felt strength return to my body but I couldn't move. I was paralyzed with fear. Master Berwald stepped into the bathroom and rushed to my side. He picked me up and cradled me in his arms. I hadn't realized how cold I was. He was so warm next to my chilled skin. He ran his fingers through my hair.

_It's okay Tino. You're safe now,_ a warm, deep voice said. I looked around in shock.

"Who—"

_It's me,_ the voice said. _I forgot my notepad so I'm using telepathy._

I looked up into his deep blue eyes. "M-master Berwald?" I stuttered. He nodded. I buried my face in his chest and cried. "I was so scared," I sobbed. He pulled me closer to him and rubbed my back.

_It's okay,_ he said. _I've got you. I'll protect you._

He held me for a few minutes, letting me enjoy his warmth. I realized that he wasn't wearing his glasses and he was dressed in his nightclothes. He must have rushed out of bed to save me. I couldn't help but think that he was my knight in shining armor. _How many ways had he saved my life?_ I wondered. _Let's see, he saved me from death by wolves, hypothermia, poisoning, and starvation. I probably would have died anyway if he hadn't given me shelter, too, so that's five. Now he saved me from these things. This man saved my life six times in about a week!_

The room was getting colder because of the broken window. I shivered pathetically.

_I'll fix that window later,_ he said. _For now, let's get you some place warm._

He walked out of my room and into the hallway. In a different circumstance, I would have been looking at my new surroundings with curiosity. But my heart continued to thud in my chest and every little sound made me squeak in fear. I hid my face in Master Berwald's neck. If he hadn't been holding me, I probably would have died of fright.

"Berwald!" a voice called, making me jump. Master Berwald rubbed my back soothingly.

_It's okay, it's just Elizabeta,_ he told me. I relaxed. _Can you ask her if all the specters are gone?_

I nodded into his shoulder and looked up at Elizabeta. She was dressed in a pale green night gown. Underneath her clothes I could see those furry goat legs that I had learned not to question. But I had never seen her without a bandana or hat on her head. Sticking out of her head, where the bandana usually covered, was a pair of curly goat horns. I decided not to ask questions despite the fact that I had about ten billion and counting.

"Um, he wants to know if all the s-specters are gone," I said, wondering what a specter was. _Is that what those things were?_

"Berwald, are you using telepathy?" she asked. She had a funny look on her face.

"He forgot his notepad," I told her when Berwald didn't reply.

"Okay… Anyway, we got all of them."

_Tell her to follow me,_ Berwald said. _I need to talk to her._

"Berwald says to follow him. He needs to talk to you."

Elizabeta nodded and followed as Berwald started down the hall. He went around a corner and down another hall before he came to a door. He carried me inside the room and closed the door behind us. Through the telepathic connection, I heard a strange whisper and then the room was filled with light.

We were in a large apartment, much bigger than mine, that had several rooms. This first room had more books than my town's library. Shelves upon shelves of books lined the walls and there were enormous stacks everywhere. But I could tell that this was not a library. It was more of a cross between someone's private office and a bedroom. Underneath a window sat an enormous desk, covered in neat piles of paper and books. Right next to the desk was a bed with a dark blue comforter. It seemed that most of the personal items in the room were that same shade of blue. The hair brush on the dresser, the clothes hanging in the closet, and even the pens on the desk were all blue.

Before I could ask any questions, Berwald lifted the covers on the bed and laid me down on the sheets. He pulled the comforter over me.

_Go to sleep Tino. I'll be right here if you need anything._ He patted my head. I was certain that I wouldn't be able to sleep after all that, but my eyes felt very heavy right then and the bed was so warm and soft…

* * *

**Berwald**

I awoke to the sound of screaming. I shot out of bed, recognizing the voice as Tino's, and sprinted into the hall. Everything was blurry without my glasses and it took me a moment to identify the dark figure in front of me. But I could smell it. The hallway was thick with the smell of rotting meat.

A specter.

"Help! Help me!" Tino screamed. _Shit, they got in his room._ I vaporized the specter in front of me and roared in anger. With a quick spell, I alerted everyone in the castle to the specters' presence. I ran around the corner and stormed into Tino's room.

Tino had stopped screaming. I didn't see him, but light was flooding out of the bathroom. Eight specters were crowded around his still form on the floor. Blue light, the light of his magic power, came off of his body, feeding the disgusting creatures. Fear dug its cold claws into my stomach. The light of my own power filled the room, a bright golden light, and the creatures turned to dust.

I picked Tino up off the floor. The boy was shaking and his face was soaked with tears, but he was alive. I sighed in relief. I had gotten to him in time. I ran my fingers through his hair, trying to calm him. I reached for my notepad, but I realized too late that I didn't have it on me. If I wanted to communicate with him, I'd have to try using telepathy. I rested my hand against his chilled skin and focused my energy on connecting our minds.

I winced as our minds connected and waves of intense fear washed over me. I never liked using telepathy, especially if the other person was experiencing intense emotions. When my mind was connected with another person's, I was not able to read their mind and they were not able to read mine, but emotions were passed back and forth freely. To communicate, messages had to be sent actively to the other person.

_It's okay Tino. You're safe now,_ I said, breaking through his fear enough for him to look around in confusion.

"Who—"

_It's me,_ I told him._ I forgot my notepad so I'm using telepathy._

He stared up at me with an expression no one has ever looked at me with. The emotion I felt from him was… gratitude? Relief? A bit of wonder? He was still terrified, but he was calming down.

"M-master Berwald?" he asked. I nodded. "I was so scared," he whispered into my shirt. I hugged him and rubbed his back.

_It's okay,_ I said. _I've got you. I'll protect you._ He nuzzled his face against my chest and warmth crept into my heart. I smiled down at the sweet boy, hoping some of my emotions would get across to him. I wanted him to know he was safe.

He shivered and I realized just how cold the room was getting. He wouldn't be able to sleep in here tonight. I walked out of the room, telling him I'd fix the window later. In the hall, I could hear the others running around on the upper levels, double checking for specters. Tino jumped at every little sound that was made. He even squeaked a few times, which I couldn't help but think was adorable.

Then Elizabeta came up behind us and startled the hell out of him. He squealed and his grip around my neck was starting to become a choke hold.

_It's okay, it's just Elizabeta, _I told him, rubbing his back. That seemed to calm him down. _Can you ask her if all the specters are gone?_ I asked.

He nodded and peaked at Elizabeta. He hesitated before saying anything and I realized that he still didn't know why Elizabeta had goat legs and goat horns. I had a lot of explaining to do. "Um, he wants to know if all the s-specters are gone," he said. I did not miss the questioning look he gave me at the word specter.

"Berwald, are you using telepathy?" she asked, completely ignoring my question. I didn't even have to ask to know what she was thinking. The damn woman was scheming again.

"He forgot his notepad," Tino responded for me.

"Okay…" she said, dropping the subject. For now. I saw that glint in her eyes. She was going to interrogate me about this later. "Anyway, we got all of them."

I told Tino to have her follow me. Despite the fact that she was going to hound me very soon, I needed to talk to her. She nodded and followed me to my room. I tucked Tino into my bed. I wasn't getting back to sleep tonight anyway.

"Did you just put a sleeping spell on him?" Elizabeta asked after Tino had fallen asleep within five seconds of being in bed.

I nodded and fetched my glasses and notepad from my nightstand. Tino huddled in a little ball in the center of my bed.

_He needs his sleep,_ I wrote.

"Is he okay?"

_He is terrified out of his wits, but he's okay. There were eight specters in his room. They broke the window and chased him into the bathroom. A little of his magic was sucked out, but it's nothing he can't recover from._

Elizabeta's eyes widened. "I thought you said he didn't have any magic power."

I shook my head. _I was wrong. I checked him for magic the same night he came here. It never crossed my mind that he was too weak at the time for me to detect anything. He isn't trained at all, but he has some latent power. I'll check him later to get an idea of how powerful he is._

"So the reason the specters attacked tonight was because he recovered enough to pop up on their radar and they wanted to try some new meat?" she asked. I nodded. "And they were desperate enough to attack when the moon is out. Great, they're getting more aggressive every year. Is that what you wanted to talk to me about?"

I nodded. _If the specters are willing to attack the castle when the moon is out, we have lost our way to predict when they will attack. I cannot keep the barrier up every single night. They will find their way in. Right now, Tino is both defenseless and a target. I need you to defend him._

She shook her head. "Berwald, my skill is not what it used to be. Sure, I can still hold my own in sparring against Gilbert, Ludwig, and Toris, but I don't have what it takes to fight against a specter."

_I need someone to protect him until he can defend himself._

"Why don't you protect him? You could have him sleep in your room and keep an eye on him all the time." I did not like sing-song quality her voice took on near the end of that sentence.

I glared at her.

"We'll discuss who's protecting him later. For now, let's talk about your telepathy thing with him~"

_Elizabeta, it has nothing to do with what you are thinking._

"Oh come on Berwald, you and I both know what this means," she teased.

_It's only a theory,_ I retorted. _There is no proof that it's true._

"You just don't want to admit that you and Tino are meant for each other!"

I sighed and shook my head. Telepathic connections were hard to make, even with people you knew well. It was considered impossible to do with someone you just met, but according to one (ridiculous) theory, if two people were 'soul mates,' then it might be possible to create a telepathic connection after recently meeting. I made the mistake of explaining this theory to Elizabeta once, never guessing that it would come back to bite me.

_There must be other factors at work here,_ I told her.

"Oh Berwald, you need to be more romantic. I get the feeling that Tino is the clingy, touchy-feely type. You know how tightly he was holding onto you. It was like you were his lifeline."

_Yeah, because he was scared out of his mind and I saved him from a bunch of walking corpses. That's why he was clinging to me. It wasn't because he wanted to._

Elizabeta huffed. "Well, he does like men."

_Yes he does. Human men. _

"You are impossible," she said, rolling her eyes. "So do you like him?"

_Not in the way you are thinking, but yes, I like him._

She grinned a shit-eating grin. "Okay, whatever you say Berwald. I'm going to leave now. Don't do anything naughty to him while he's asleep. That's rape~" she sang.

In big letters I wrote, _I hate you!_

She patted my head. "I love you too!" She left my room.

I pinched the bridge of my nose. God, she could be annoying sometimes. For that, I don't care what she says, I'm making her defend Tino.

I decided that since I could use telepathy with Tino, writing down my story for him would be pointless. I could just tell him, assuming he didn't mind me touching him for the entire time. How was I able to use telepathy with him anyway? Why did I even try? I had known him for a day. I shouldn't have been able to connect with him. I still wasn't able to communicate this way with Elizabeta, Ludwig, or Lovino and I had known them for centuries. I knew it was easier for two people with magic powers to use telepathy, but Tino wasn't trained at all, and it took me decades to connect with Alice, who was a powerful sorceress.

I pulled out several books on the subject and sat down at my desk. Maybe I had missed something.

* * *

I awoke to the light of the bright morning sun streaming through my window. Birds sang in their nests as the sun woke them up. I shook myself awake and stretched. My joints were stiff from sleeping at my desk. My glasses had fallen off at some point. I put them back on and the world came into focus.

"Master Berwald," Tino's sleepy voice mumbled. I turned around to see him trying to sit up. I hopped up from my desk and arranged the pillows behind him to prop him up. He seemed weaker than he did yesterday. The specters sapped some of his strength. "Where am I?" he asked, looking confused.

_My room, _I told him. My notepad was still on my desk and I was already touching him, so I might as well use the telepathic connection.

His eyes widened. "I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to take over your bed!"

I patted his head. _It's fine. You needed sleep more than I did._

He sighed. "You are too kind, Master Berwald." He looked around my room. "Is blue your favorite color?" he asked, noticing the fact that nearly everything I owned was blue.

_It is. How could you tell?_ I teased. Since when did I tease?

He smirked at me. "Oh, just a lucky guess. Anyway, good morning," he said, giving me a bright smile and a hug. My eyes widened. When was the last time someone had given me a real hug? It had been at least a century, probably longer. I couldn't help but smile and wrap my arms around him.

_Good morning,_ I said. I felt blood rise to my cheeks when I held him for a couple seconds too long, and I had never been so thankful for the fur covering my face. At least Tino didn't seem to notice those awkward extra seconds.

"Thank you for saving me last night. Again. I have no idea how I'm ever going to repay you."

I shook my head. _You talk like I have some ulterior motive for protecting you. I'm just glad you're safe._

He blushed and changed the subject. "You know, every time something happens, I just have more and more questions."

_I'll do my best to answer them._

"Okay… why don't you always use telepathy? It seems way more convenient than writing everything."

_To use telepathy, I have to be touching the person I'm communicating with and that person cannot be a stranger. Also I can only use it with one person at a time._

"Oh, that sucks. There's no way to use telepathy long distance? What's the point of having it unless you are mute?"

_The kind I use is modified from black magic, which uses it most often. In black magic, telepathy can be done over a distance, but it requires having enough of the other person's blood to cover your hand._

He made a face. "That's creepy."

_Yes, but that's how all black magic is. Nine out of ten spells require you to cover yourself in someone else's blood. Anyway, next question._

"What were those things from last night?"

_Those were specters. They are a kind of low level demon. Moonlight weakens them and the sun will destroy them, but artificial light doesn't seem to bother them. They have some small level of thinking abilities and they only pose a threat to humans with magical powers. They can sense humans with magic from miles away and will gather to feed off of them. That's what they were trying to do to you._

His brow furrowed in confusion. "What? I-I don't have any power."

_Apparently you do. The blue light that they were eating, that's your power._

"How can I have power if I can't do magic?"

_Have you ever tried?_

"Well… no, but…"

_Didn't you say that your grandmother was a sorceress? __I would assume it runs in your family. Do you have anyone else in your family who can do magic?_

He nodded. "My mom could, but the only thing she and my father ever agreed upon was that sorcery was evil, so she never used it. My older sister, Nora is pretty good considering she has had no one to teach her since my grandmother died. Granny managed to teach Nora a little and she left all of her spell books to her. Nora liked to fool around with them when our parents weren't around. Once she used a spell to turn my hair pink in the middle of the night." I chuckled.

"It took her three days to get my hair back to normal," he told me. "We were so worried that Father would come home and freak out at us, but somehow she fixed it in time. Most of the spells she knows are like that. They're just simple spells, mostly useful for showing off that you know how to use magic, and for household things like boiling water. When I first got sick, she searched for anything that could make me better, but she found nothing."

I nodded. _It took a powerful spell to clear the poison from your veins. There are not many sorcerers in the world who are familiar with that specific poison. It was by a stroke of great fortune that you found me._

He smiled slightly. "In a weird way, I'm kind of glad I was poisoned. I never would have met you and Alice and Elizabeta otherwise."

_I'm glad to have met you too,_ I said, giving him a smile. I felt a strange tug on my heart and it started racing. _Are you hungry? _I asked, changing the subject. _Alice should be here with breakfast any minute now. After breakfast hopefully I'll be able to answer all of your questions._

"Hm, doubtful. I have a lot."

_I'll give it my best shot,_ I said. _But first, it's time for you to drink a delicious potion._

"Oh no!" he said as I got up. I went to my bathroom cupboard and pulled out the ingredients for the potion. It was actually very simple to make, having only three ingredients. Tino did not need to know that the most important one was ogre milk. It gave the potion its blue color and bitter flavor and it was actually very nutritious. After all, you never see skinny, malnourished baby ogres. But knowing that he was drinking ogre milk would definitely freak Tino out.

"You keep your potion stuff in your bathroom?" he asked, looking amused. He would not look so smug if he knew that he was drinking ogre milk. I mixed the potion up, infused it with magic, and poured it into a cup. Tino took the cup and made a face, but he chugged it. He looked stronger and more alert almost immediately. After just three days of taking it, his face was starting to fill out and he didn't look quite so boney anymore. He would probably be back to his normal weight within the next week or so.

I sat down next him on the bed as we waited for Alice. I hoped he would say something. I always felt awkward starting up a conversation and usually I didn't like saying anything to anyone. But Tino was different. For some reason, I felt comfortable talking to him. Maybe that's why I was able to connect with him so easily.

My heart began to pound when I remembered what Elizabeta said. We were meant for each other. _I don't think I would mind that._ _No. No Berwald, you cannot think that. He is seventeen. You are over two hundred years old. He is off limits._

"So does everyone have to work even after a night like last night?" he asked. I nodded. "Wow, I feel totally useless now. When I get better, I'll do my best to pull my weight!"

I smiled at his eagerness. _What kinds of things are you good at?_

"Well, not to brag or anything, but I'm a really good hunter. Archery is my specialty." I was surprised, to say the least. He didn't seem like someone who would be into hunting. "But now I'm really out of practice." He sighed. "Just thinking about it really makes me want to get out of bed and shoot some arrows."

_Don't worry. You'll be back on your feet in no time. We have plenty of archery equipment for you to use. And I can teach you sorcery if you'd like._

His face brightened. "Oh my god! I'd love that! Thank you!" He threw his arms around me. That makes two hugs in one day. He looked like his face was going to split in half, he was smiling so hard. Once again, I was really glad he couldn't see how red my face was.

There was a knock at the door and I pulled away from him. Alice walked in with two trays of food and a large pot of coffee.

"Good morning," she said, handing each of us a tray. Tino's breakfast was scrambled eggs, toast with jam, and a glass of milk. Mine was eggs sunny-side-up, sausage, biscuits, and coffee.

"Good morning Alice," Tino sang. I nodded to her in greeting.

"Well, aren't you cheery this morning," she teased Tino.

"I'm always cheery!" Tino giggled and took a bite of his eggs. "Wow these eggs are delicious, Alice!"

I snorted and wondered if Alice would admit to being a terrible cook.

"Shut up Master!" she hissed. "I know what you are thinking!"

Tino looked confused. "Wait, what's going on?"

I touched his arm. _Alice can't cook. At all._

"Oh… so who made the eggs?" he asked.

"Master, you are an ass!" she yelled.

I ignored her._ Feliciano made them. He's our chef,_ I told Tino.

"I see," he said. He looked up at Alice. "It's okay Alice. I can't cook either."

Alice huffed and crossed her arms. "Well Master," she said. "I assume you can take care of the dishes yourself." And with that she stormed out of the room.

Tino looked worried. "Is she okay? Her feelings aren't hurt, right?"

I shook my head. _She pretends to be mad at everyone when we bring up her cooking skills. A long time ago, she was really sensitive about it, but now it's just a joke._

He breathed a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness. I was worried that she was really mad." He took a bite of his toast and I poured myself a cup of coffee. "Hey is that coffee?" he asked.

I nodded. _Do you want some?_

"Yes please! Oh crap, I don't have a cup, um… Oh!" He held out the glass that held his potion. I poured him a cup.

_I don't have any sugar…_

He shook his head and took a sip. "That's fine. I drink it black anyway." Hm, he certainly was full of surprises. "Wow, this coffee is really good. Come to think of it, I haven't eaten anything here that didn't taste amazing."

_Feliciano is an amazing chef. He's worked here for… a long time. Since I was a kid._

"You know, you look pretty young to me, but I guess I can't tell very well. And Alice said that she was much older than she looks, so I assume you are too. How old are you exactly?"

_Physically, I'm twenty four, but I've been twenty four for about two hundred years._

He choked on his eggs. "You're two hundred years old! How? Is Alice that old too?"

I nodded.

"And Elizabeta?"

_Elizabeta too. And so is everyone else in the castle that you haven't met yet, with the exception of Alfred, Matthew, and Sakura, who are younger, but still pretty old by your standards. This is what I started writing last night, but I decided that since I can use telepathy with you, I'll just tell you. Finish your breakfast and I'll tell you my life story._

He hurriedly gobbled the rest of his food.

* * *

**Tino**

Master Berwald was two hundred years old! I couldn't quite wrap my mind around that. For some reason, I felt disappointed. I laughed at myself. _Yeah, because if he wasn't that old, I'd have a chance at him. Get it together Tino!_

When I was finished eating he set my tray to the side.

_Comfy?_ He asked. I nodded and he began speaking.

_So my father, Ivan Braginsky, came from a powerful family of sorcerers, and when he was a young man, he ran away from home because he didn't want to marry his younger sister, Natalya._

I raised an eyebrow at this. "Was that really a genuine concern for him?"

_Yes, yes it was. The creepiest thing is that he didn't want to marry her, not because she was his sister, but because she was a homicidal maniac. My father told me once that if he was supposed to marry his older sister, Katyusha, then he would have stayed, because Katyusha was the nice, sane sister. They would have happily had creepy inbred children together. But Katyusha wasn't actually a sorceress, although she had the power to break any curse. So my father had to marry his crazy younger sister because she was as powerful as she was insane and his family wanted to keep the line pure, which by the way, doesn't actually work. You just end up with cross-eyed, three-armed children, some of which will be insane._

I could help but snicker at Berwald's total change of tone.

_It's true. While I love and respect my father, he was not the picture of perfect mental health. He talked to people who weren't there, he didn't like paintings of eyes because he was certain that Natalya was spying on him through them, and occasionally he would beat people up or destroy parts of the castle and blame it on 'General Winter.'_

"Um… wow… I guess I have no right to complain about my father."

He shook his head. _No your father is a whole different bag of nuts. My father has been mad at me, hell, he's been furious at me, but never enough to want to kill me. Even at his worst he still made me eat dinner with him and Mother, which was a form of punishment all on its own. Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself. After my father ran away, he went looking for a teacher who could make him more powerful than his sister. He traveled for a long time, looking for a certain powerful sorcerer, who happened to be my grandfather. You may have heard of him. They used to call him Berwald the Lion—_

"Your grandfather was Berwald the Lion?!" I interrupted. "Oh my god, I didn't even think he was a real person! My granny used to tell stories about his adventures to me and my sisters. Is he the same man who saved the beautiful princess of Valtakunta* from the evil dragon Paha*? Did they really get married? Does that mean you're a prince?"

Master Berwald's lips twitched in amusement. _I don't think it happened quite like the stories say. My grandfather really did kill the dragon Paha, but he was paid by the king of Valtakunta to get rid of it because it was a nuisance that kept eating all the sheep. My grandmother was a princess of Valtakunta, but she was like, the seventh princess or something like that. And my grandfather didn't save her from the dragon. She was perfectly safe through the whole thing. She was actually a one-eyed mute, because again, her parents were siblings, and because of her deformity, she had no prospects for marriage. But my grandfather had strange tastes and thought she was beautiful, and the king was just happy to have someone take her off his hands._

I frowned. "That is really disappointing."

_Sorry._

I shook my head. "It's fine, keep going."

_To say that my grandfather was a reclusive man would be an understatement. Compared to him, I am a social butterfly. He lived in the middle of this forest specifically to avoid people. All of his servants were silent phantoms that he controlled because he didn't like real people. He put the entire forest under an enchantment that made it impossible to find the castle if you knew where you were. Only if you became completely and utterly lost could you find it. Even though the castle should be tall enough to be seen above the tree tops for miles around, almost nobody knows that it's here, because of that enchantment. No matter what I do, I've never been able to remove the enchantment. My father tried many times as well, but the damn spell is stubborn._

"Is that how I got to the castle even though I was aimlessly running through the woods?"

_Exactly,_ he said. Then, a downcast look appeared on his face and his tone changed.

_By the time my father reached the castle, my grandfather had been dead for a year. Instead, he found my mother, Maja, all alone here. My mother allowed him to stay and gave him access to my grandfather's library, which had thousands of books on sorcery. He studied hard and learned a lot. He read nearly half of the books in the library. He and my mother ended up becoming very close, and my father asked her to marry her. They had a small ceremony with just the two of them. My father decided to take my mother's name to make it harder for his sister to find him._

_A couple of years later, I was born. As I grew up, my father taught me sorcery, and my mother taught me other things like gardening, cooking, and woodcarving. We were totally alone here for years before they hired servants._

_My father was the one who released the specters into the forest. He specialized in demon magic and he was able to control them. They were supposed to stop Natalya, should she ever enter the forest. After a while, my father became confident that his sister had given up and would never find him. But the year I turned fifteen, everything changed. It was the night of the first snowfall that year, when a young woman appeared on our doorstep. She seemed lost, cold, and afraid, so she was welcomed into the castle and was invited to spend the night._

_At around midnight, I was awoken by the sound of my parents screaming. I ran to their room and found the woman, who I then realized was the aunt I had heard so much about. She stood over my parents' bed. My mother was already dead and my father was close. He yelled at me to run away, but I was so scared that I couldn't move. Before I could do anything, Natalya forced me against the wall and gagged me so that I couldn't use magic. I could only watch as my father took his last breaths._

_She didn't kill me though. She put this curse on me. _

I squeezed his hand. It was so much larger than mine. It was warm too. The back of his hand was covered in the same thick golden fur as the rest of his body, but the palm side was smooth and hairless, like the pads of a cat's feet. Instead of fingernails, he had curved black claws at the end of each finger. I realized that he must file them because the tips were rounded.

He gave me a smile. _It's okay. I'm used to it,_ he said.

"Why would she choose to turn you into a lion?" I asked.

_The curse mixed my human form with my spirit animal, which is a lion. I believe that Natalya did this with the knowledge that I wouldn't be able to speak and therefore, whatever power I had would be rendered useless. This worked for a short time until I learned to use magic without speaking, but as you can see, I cannot form words with this mouth._

"So she was trying to take away your power?" I asked. He nodded. "Oh. Luckily it backfired. What's a spirit animal?"

_Every person, whether they become a sorcerer or not, has a connection to one type of animal or another. It is usually an animal with which you share certain traits. That animal is called your spirit animal. This is not explicitly something intended for sorcery, but sorcerers usually have a stronger connection to their 'spirit animal' than other people._

"Why is Elizabeta cursed too? Is everyone else in the castle cursed as well?"

He nodded. _Natalya was very powerful. Her curse affected not only me, but my entire household. The others were affected less than I was on this aspect of the curse, but they are no longer entirely human. You have probably guessed by now that Elizabeta's spirit animal is a goat, considering her goat horns and goat legs. One of our guards, Gilbert, has a bird's beak instead of a nose and mouth, and his arms are covered in feathers. For some reason, his spirit animal is a cockatiel. I assume it's because he is annoying and so are birds._

_The other part of the curse makes it impossible to leave the castle. I believe Natalya did that to make the curse much more difficult to break. I think she intended to trap us here for the rest of our lives. The good thing about curses, if there is anything good about them, is that you cannot make one without specifying a way to break it, and it has to be something that is possible to do. Most sorcerers prefer the classic 'true love's first kiss' to break the curse, but that isn't exactly my aunt's style. Instead, the key to breaking my curse was her sister, Katyusha, who had the power to break curses._

_We were lucky that Alice's nephew, Hong, was not in the castle at the time. He is immune to the enchantment on the forest, because his father, who was a sorcerer and Alice's older brother, and his mother, a Kiinalainen* medicine woman, combined their knowledge to give him a tattoo that left him unaffected by enchantments. So we often used him to trade in nearby towns. Because he could still freely travel away from the castle, I had Hong go in search of Katyusha. However, it did not work out so well. Before we even knew how to break the curse, Natalya had already poisoned Katyusha, and our only hope was dead._

_After this, I tried everything I could to break the curse. I managed to loosen it a little, allowing us to go outside. We are able to be outside as far as we like, as long as the castle is still in sight. But in everything else, the curse is very resilient. For seven years, I tried endlessly to break it, or even to bend it a little, but nothing else changed. Not to mention the fact that, without my father to control them, the specters were free to do whatever they wanted and they started to attack us whenever they had the chance. Luckily my father put up a barrier to prevent them from leaving the forest, so they are just as trapped as we are. They aren't a threat to anyone who stays out of the forest at night or anyone who doesn't have magic._

_I was twenty-three years old when I decided that I would not let us die trapped in this castle. It took me another year, but I made a potion that made us immortal. I thought it was funny that immortality could be achieved so much more easily than breaking a stupid curse, but I suppose the world is strange that way. I was twenty-four when I took the potion and most of my household took it that year as well._

_It has been two hundred years since that time, and I am no closer to breaking the curse than I was then. I fear that instead of preventing us from dying like trapped animals, I have only trapped us here for all eternity._

"You've been stuck here for two hundred years?" I asked. He nodded.

"What exactly is there to do for that long? I mean, I have the attention span of a squirrel, and I can barely stay in my house for a whole day without going stir crazy. How have you kept yourself sane for that long?"

_Well, I spent twenty years teaching everyone how to read. Luckily, Alice, Francis, Roderick, and somehow, Feliciano, knew how to already, so I had help. And we had my grandfather's giant library for practice. I taught each of them individually and I became much closer to everyone. I stopped seeing them as servants, and started seeing them as my family. Most of them stopped calling me 'master,' although Alice calls me that out of habit. You don't have to call me master if you don't want to. Berwald is just fine._

I smiled at him. "Okay… Berwald," I said. I don't know why, but saying him name made me blush. He gave me a smile and my heart melted. I felt a pool of heat building in my stomach. _Crap, I knew this feeling. No, no, no! I can't have feelings for him! Yes, he might be accepting of my interest in men, but this was crossing a line._ He continued talking, unaware of how flustered I was becoming.

_I taught everyone the basics of sorcery and a couple of them ended up being able to perform magic. Alice actually became very good at sorcery. Even though she is the type of person who can burn milk, she has a natural talent for potions. And Feliciano is always full of surprises. He is quite an airhead, and when I was younger he used to annoy me because I thought he was loud and stupid, but I think he's smarter than he lets on. He is an amazing artist, so if I ever need a complex circle drawn for a spell, I usually have him draw it. He has actually invented a few magic circles of his own, which is something even I'm not good at. One magic circle he made creates bowls of hot pasta._

"That's kind of weird," I said.

_Feliciano is pretty strange, but he fits in well. Even without the curse, everyone here is odd._

"Well, I'm pretty odd myself. Think I'll fit in?"

He grinned. _I'm sure you will._

* * *

**Alice**

As I rounded the corner and Berwald's door came into view, Berwald stepped out. I decided not to comment on the really, really out of character smile on his face.

"Good afternoon, Master Berwald," I said. "Is Tino still in your room? I have his lunch."

He nodded and wrote on his notepad. _I'm going to fix his window so he can sleep in his room tonight._

"Okay then, I'll talk to you later." He left for Tino's room with a slight spring in his step. I shook my head and walked into his room. Tino was sitting up in the bed. He gave me a big smile and I handed him his food.

''How are you Tino? Are you okay after last night? I heard that the specters went after you."

He nodded, taking a bite of his roll. "I'm okay. Berwald saved me, after all. He is so kind. And he is really cool too. We've been talking ever since you left."

I raised an eyebrow. When I left it was around nine in the morning and now it was one in the afternoon.

"You talked to him for four hours?!" _My goodness_. Tino seemed like a chatter box, but I didn't think he'd be that bad. Berwald could barely carry on a conversation for ten minutes. The poor man was probably trying to escape.

Tino nodded. "He had a lot to say."

My brows furrowed. _He didn't mean that Master Berwald did most of the talking, did he? _"Tino, how much did he talk?"

"Um, a lot. He explained pretty much everything from his family, to the curse, and we also talked about a lot of random stuff. He is pretty talkative when you get him going, and he's hilarious when he talks about how his father's family was inbred."

I felt my eye twitch. _Master Berwald, talkative? Hilarious?_

"Alice, why are you making that face?"

"Oh it's nothing dearie, the world as I know it is just crumbling into chaos, but it's nothing."

He laughed nervously. "What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about Master Berwald. The man can barely talk about anything for more than ten minutes. He has the worst social phobia I've ever seen. Most days he doesn't even write a response to my questions. I'll say, 'would you like ham or venison?' and all he'll do is nod, forcing me to give him both," I said as hysteria started to creep into my voice. "For the first week after he was cursed, we didn't know that he couldn't talk because there was almost no change. Even when he was a kid he was the quietest person I had ever met and he had no sense of humor to speak of. Only in the past fifty years has he started developing a sense of humor and it's still a far cry from witty, much less hilarious."

Tino looked really confused by this. "But he… he was funny and he did most of the talking. Maybe it's because he doesn't use telepathy often. He seems like the kind of person who lives in his head and maybe the telepathy helped him express himself better."

"That might be it," I said, although what I really wanted to do was freak out and yell, _'He used telepathy with you?!'_ Putting aside the fact that a connection was difficult to establish in the first place, he didn't even like using it. It was only something he did if it was a necessity. Master Berwald had it bad for the boy. I could only hope that Tino felt the same way.

* * *

Aw, don't you worry Alice, this is a fairy tail. Of course their going to live happily ever after. That doesn't even count as a spoiler.

*Valtakunta is Finnish for kingdom; Paha=evil; and Kiinalainen=Chinese. I'm not creative when it comes to naming things, and Finnish sounds awesome. Also Hong Kong is just Hong because I suck at naming. Also, I'm using Finnish place names for certain countries, because I still haven't decided if this takes place in our world or not.

Next chapter: It's sub-plot time! We get to see what's going on back in Tino's village, told through the POV of his awesome, bitchy, and kind of depressed sister Nora (who is femNorway). Remember, there are multiple fairy tails going on in this fic, so Norway gets to be Snow White and Denmark gets to be Prince Charming (except that he's not a prince and the only person he charms is Norway, but whatever)

Please review =D

~Firewolf


	5. Chapter 4: A Heart of Ice

Hello wonderful readers!

Welcome to chapter four, where you will be introduced to a butt-load of new characters. Somehow, Romania ended up being a major character, don't ask me how. In the original draft he only had three lines in chapter 19. Now he has entire paragraphs. Anyway, to help you keep the characters who don't have official names straight, Andrei is Romania, Elise is Liechtenstein, and Louise is Belgium. There are also some OCs, like the Kohler family, which is Denmark's/Mikkel's family, and Marten von Bock, who is Eduard's father. I still have yet to name Tino's father. If anyone has a suggestion for his name I'd love to hear it.

If anyone wants to get a general idea of what this world looks like, then go here: art/ Beautiful-Beast-Map- 366565694?q=gallery%3 Afirewolf137&qo=0 (remove the spaces) I made a crappy map of all the places that exist so far in this story =D

Enjoy!

* * *

Chapter 4—A Heart of Ice

**Nora**

Gray snow clouds hovered low in the sky, but they waited to spill their burden, almost in respect for the dead. Old snow frosted the cemetery grounds, making the earth frozen solid. There would be no burial today. People who died in winter were always cremated. It was better than waiting until the ground had thawed enough to bury the body. But we didn't even have a body to burn. All we had was an empty coffin.

They set the empty box on fire. The temple priest, dressed in his gray funeral vestments, chanted prayers to give Tino's soul a speedy entrance into the afterlife. _How could he get there? Not even fire could release his soul from this world if we had no body to burn._

I drew my cloak tighter around myself. I wondered if I would end up like Tino. _Would I die at a young age of an illness that made me scream out in the night and caused my body to waste away until I was nothing?_ Perhaps it was better that we didn't have his body. We could remember him for what he looked like, instead of that feeble frame he had become in those last days of his life. I remembered Mom's funeral. She had been a large woman before she got sick, but when she was near the end, she didn't look like my mother at all. She was just a skeleton held together by brittle bones and a thin bag of skin.

Next to me, Emilia sobbed. I must have looked like stone next to her. She could barely stand up as she choked on her tears, while I stood silent and impassive. I wanted to put my arm around her, but I didn't. _Why was I so useless? I couldn't save my brother. I couldn't comfort my sister. What was I good for? Was I just a waste of air?_

I would not cry for him, no matter how much I missed my silly, naïve little brother. I could miss his smiles, his laughter, his bubbly personality all I wanted, but I knew he wasn't suffering anymore and for that I was grateful. If anything, I was jealous of him. He was dead, but he got to escape this miserable place. _What if I took off running into the forest like that? _It would be suicide, but I would be gone from here. But no matter how loud the embrace of those demon woods called for me, I would never go. I was too scared. Somehow my own life was still too valuable to me to end it.

Emilia cried into her friend Elise's shoulder. Elise wrapped her arms around her as she whispered those silly words people always say to comfort the aggrieved. "Shh, it's okay, Emi. He's in a better place. He isn't in pain anymore. He's with your mom now."

The box was quickly becoming ash. The funeral was almost over, but no one was leaving early. I looked at the crowd gathered here. Tino had been loved by so many. He had always been the most sociable in the family, and he was so sweet, it was difficult not to love him. Though rumors, which my father had been quick to suppress, about Tino's illicit affair with Eduard von Bock had spread like wildfire through the town, it seemed to have no effect on attendance. People still loved Tino, despite the rumors. Even Mayor Marten von Bock, Eduard's father, grieved Tino's loss. He who had threatened to have Tino hung for 'seducing his son,' shed tears.

Thankfully, my father had the decency to not bar Eduard from the funeral. I knew that he wanted to, but no matter how powerful Father was, starting a war with the Mayor would not end well. Eduard sobbed uncontrollably. He was a mess, not having shaved in about a week from the looks of it, and judging by his unsteady swaying, he had been down in his cups recently. Though Eduard cried the hardest, all three of Tino's former sweethearts cried for him. Even the ever stoic Vash Zwingli had tears to spare. He made no sound, but several silent tears streamed down his face. Directly behind me, I could hear Andrei failing to stifle his sobs.

And then, it was over. The ashes were scattered, the tombstone was erected, and the memorial of my little brother's life was over. Life went on without him. People were starting to leave for their homes. Two girls I knew, Sophia and Ingrid, passed by us.

"Oh my god, she doesn't even cry at her brother's funeral," Sophia said loudly.

"She really is an Ice Princess," Ingrid replied. "You think if she cried, her tears would freeze?"

Sophia laughed. "I bet she doesn't cry because it would ruin her pretty face."

I ignored them.

"Dad, can I go with Elise?" Emilia asked. Father nodded. "Thank you." Elise had her arm around her the entire way to her house with Vash following behind them. Father and I walked home in silence.

When we got inside, Father put his hand on my shoulder. "Nora, are you okay?" he asked. His face looked so earnest that I almost believed him, but the emotion didn't go to his eyes.

I shrugged him off. "Stop acting like you care," I snapped. "You didn't care about Mom. You didn't care about Tino. And I know you don't give two shits about me!"

He slapped me, leaving me with a stinging cheek. I didn't flinch, I only glared at him. He glared back.

"I was never given a reason to care. Your mother hated me the moment we met. She thought she was too damn good to marry a merchant. Do you know how many other men the bitch slept with? I'm not sure you are even my daughter. For all I know, you could be Marten von Bock's daughter."

"What?" This was news to me as Father rarely talked about Mom.

"Yeah, Marten von Bock. That's who your mother was fucking around the time you were conceived; the fucking mayor. There is a possibility that I haven't been raising my own children. I'm sure Emilia is my daughter and Tino was my son. Both of them bare resemblance to me. But you Nora, I can never be sure. When I look at you, all I see is her and none of me. Every man in this goddamned town has been inside your whore of a mother and you could be anyone's daughter."

"You're lying!" I yelled.

"What's the matter Nora? Can you not face the fact that you're the daughter of a whore? And then there's your brother. True, I am saddened that I have lost my only son and heir, but that boy was a mistake of nature. From the time he could talk every damn thing out of his mouth was sugarcoated in gumdrops and lollipops. I just knew he'd turn out the way he did, but I was stupid and thought I could change him. He picked up hunting nicely, but it didn't change him one bit. I still caught him with that man. Only the gods know how many times he spread his legs for him."

I clenched my fist. "Tino wasn't like that. All they did was kiss."

He snorted. "Oh really? Just how well did you know your brother? I stood inside that horse stable for fifteen minutes before they even noticed me and believe me, I know all I ever needed to know about your sweet, innocent little brother. Tino didn't even question it when Eduard stuck his hands down his pants. You know what he did then? He moaned. He moaned like the little slut he is. Your little brother would have bent over and taken it up the ass just like your whore of a mother."

"Stop talking about him like that," I said, grinding my teeth.

"Did I upset you Nora? I'm sorry. Let's talk about you? After all, you are a much greater disappointment to me than your brother ever was."

I relaxed a little when he said this. _Good. He wasn't slandering Tino anymore._ I could take anything he said about me, but not Tino. He didn't deserve it.

"You always were a cold fish, but I never guessed you'd be icy enough to ruin three betrothals."

I knew now that I was in for a long-winded rant and most likely a beating. That's how he always got when this topic was brought up.

"First, you fuck up a marriage with Prince Frederick. You could have been the goddamn queen if you weren't such a bitch! Then, you have the gall to offend a lord and then a merchant who were offering to marry you. Now the best marriage I can get for you is to the son of the town butcher! And that stupid kid isn't even Magnus's oldest son. He's the fifth! He isn't getting any inheritance at all. Hell, he lives in fucking _Viima_ in a tiny shack next to the goddamn Atall Forest because he can't afford anything else! Lucky for you he has a real job so he won't be home all day drinking himself to death and beating the ever loving hell out of you! And don't think for a second he won't beat you—"

"Can we just skip this part Father? I'm well aware that I'm a dried up bitch and I'll never be able to please my husband. You've told me countless times. I'd rather just get the beating over with."

His face filled with rage and he grabbed the belt off the hook in the wall. He snapped it a few times, trying to make me flinch, but I had learned long ago how not to show any weakness in front of him. I braced myself against the couch. He slapped me across my back first, though not very hard. There wouldn't even be a bruise from that one.

"You know, sometimes I think you actually like getting beaten," he said. I didn't rise to the bait. He was quiet as he whipped my back, shoulders, and legs. I silently counted the lashes. After a couple minutes, he threw the belt to the side and stormed off to the kitchen. "Get out of my sight."

I smirked slightly. He could beat me all he wanted, but I made sure it was never any fun for him.

I went off to my room to inspect the damage. I undid the laces of my corset and pulled my dress off. My skin was starting to bruise already, but it looked better than usual after a beating. _Well, Father was getting on in years._ I made a note of the number of lashes and the lighter bruising in my notebook.

_January 8__th__, Game # 763; 72 lashes with belt; wins—719; losses—44; blows weaker than normal; Father should probably see a doctor_

This was my secret game I played and I had been winning for years. If I cried out or flinched or tried to defend myself, he won. If he got bored and threw the belt down, I won. I had played this game since I was twelve and I the last time I lost was when I was fourteen and he broke my finger after I ruined my first betrothal. I had a five year winning streak.

I peeked outside my room to see what Father was doing. I could see the top of his balding head over the back of the couch. He was drinking and probably doing some paper work, so he wouldn't catch me. I closed my door quietly and hurried to my nightstand. I slid open the bottom drawer, pushed the pile of candle stubs to the side, pulled up the false bottom, and took out one of Grandma's spell books. It was a small purple notebook filled from margin to margin with helpful spells, scrawled in my grandmother's tiny handwriting.

I flipped open to the first bookmarked page. It wasn't the spell I was looking for. Sadness and guilt welled up in me at the sight of this spell. I had used it so many times I knew it by heart. It was for easing nausea. I had used it on Tino every time he had to eat so he could keep some food down. It helped him a little, but all I did was prolong his pain.

I sighed and flipped to the next bookmark and found the spell for healing. It wasn't a fast acting spell and it wouldn't make my bruises suddenly disappear, but it would make them fade faster. Even if I knew a spell that would make the bruises disappear, I couldn't use it for fear that Father may notice.

I reached for the store of magic inside me and whispered the spell as quietly as possible. The slight ache in my back lessened. I returned the spell book to the false bottom drawer and started putting my clothes back on. When I was dressed, I looked at the old clock on my dresser. It was two in the afternoon. _Time to start working on dinner._

With my dress and corset on, and spells books hidden, I walked into the sitting room. I tied a red kerchief over my head and pulled my riding cloak off the hook by the door.

"Father, I'm going to the butcher's for meat. What would you like?"

"See if Magnus has any moose," he said without looking up from his work. "If he doesn't, get some venison."

I nodded and opened the front door, grabbing a wicker basket on the way out.

"Oh and Nora," he said. I stopped and looked back at him. "Remember, I'm going to be out on business for the next week. Go to Andrei's and get yourself a chicken."

"Thank you Father," I said. I left the house feeling a bit happier. I had almost forgotten that Father was going to the market in Punianen this week and he was taking Emilia with him. I'd have the house all to myself.

I strolled down the road to the main street where the butcher shop was. I decided to go here first as I would definitely talk to Andrei for at least an hour and I wanted to get this part over with. I disliked going to the butcher shop run by Magnus Kohler. When Tino was alive, we rarely had to buy anything from here, because he was such a good hunter. Even when the hunting was bad, he could bag a couple rabbits for dinner. This was one more thing I'd have to become accustomed to without Tino around; going to the butcher shop. At least in winter the place didn't smell of rotting meat. The bell on the door chimed when I walked in.

"Good afternoon, Miss Nora," Magnus said from behind the bloodstained counter.

I put on my best polite face. "Good afternoon, Mr. Kohler." Magnus gave me the creeps. He always gave girls this toothy smile that made my skin crawl. Ever since he patted Emilia on the rump a couple years ago, I haven't trusted him. _And now he is going to be my father-in-law. Great. _

"What'll it be?" he asked. He set his butcher knife to the side and looked somewhere other than my face. I was happy to be wearing a corset that covered me.

"Do you have any moose?" I asked.

He licked his lips. "Yea, I think we got some moose. Oi, Liam!" he yelled. Liam, the eldest of Magnus's nineteen children, came out of the back room of the shop. Liam was the spitting image of his father. He was a large man, about thirty years old, with long blond hair pulled back in a ponytail and a dirty beard. He had mean, beady little eyes and a lecherous smile.

"What?" he asked his father.

"We got any moose fer the lady?"

Liam eyed my chest. "Yea, I think we got some moose fer her. Whada ya wan'? Shoulder? Rib? Neck? That's all we got right now."

"Shoulder please," I said. Liam nodded.

"Are ya makin' a tasty stew?" Magnus asked when Liam went into the back room.

I nodded. Liam came back a moment later with a hunk of meat and wrapped it in parchment paper.

"Here ya go Nora," he said, handing me the meat.

"Thank you," I said and put the package in my basket. I noticed that his right hand was bandaged and missing its middle, ring, and pinky fingers. He saw me looking at it.

"Ya wanna know what happ'ned?" Liam asked. I nodded. "It wasn' from butcherin' if that's what yer thinkin.' Yer father paid me an' a couple o' other guys to go into tha forest an' search fer yer lil brother's body."

My eyes widened in shock. "Why would Father pay you to look for Tino's body?" I asked. Even if there was a chance that Tino was alive, it was considered suicide to enter the forest.

Liam shrugged. "Hell if I know. I don't question a man who's willin' to pay five hundred goldies. We never found yer lil brother, but I sure know what happ'ned to 'im. I had a run with the Beast of Atall. I saw it, but it don' look like what people say. It ain't no troll that's fer sure. It's a hound. Looked like one o' them big ol' alpha wolves but it had nasty red eyes an' it stank like death. It got my hand in its jaws an' it tore straight through the bone. Started munchin' on the fingers, but while it was distracted, I done ran fer it. I wasn' that far in the forest, so I managed to get out alive. But I tell ya, Nora, what happ'ned was that thing went an' ate yer lil brother."

Magnus stomped on his son's foot.

"Fuck Pop, what tha hell was that fer?" Liam cursed, jumping up and down while holding his foot.

"That's fer bein' an idiot," he said. He turned to me. "Will that be all Miss Nora?"

"Yes sir," I said, for once glad that Magnus was there.

"That'll be thirty coppers. Wan' it on yer father's tab?"

"Yes," I said. Magnus pulled a pen out and made a note in his register.

"Thank ya, Miss Nora. Hope to see ya again soon. Yer going out wit Mikkel tomorrow, right?"

"Yes, I'm excited to finally meet him," I lied and pushed the door open. "Talk to you later Magnus, Liam."

As I left the shop I could hear Liam talking to Magnus.

"Damn it Pop, how tha hell did fuckin' stupid Mikkel get that fine piece o' ass!"

Magnus laughed. "Ya know that 'er father's just tryin' to get rid o' 'er. She's so infamous that he can't get her married to anyone 'cause everyone knows who tha Ice Princess is. Tha only reason I set 'er up wit Mikkel was that 'er father is payin' outta his ass to get somebody to take 'er off his hands."

I walked on, not hearing the rest of the conversation. Magnus didn't know how right he was. Father was just trying to push me off onto any man whose father was dumb enough to accept and Magnus Kohler just so happened to be that man. I didn't know much about Mikkel. I knew that he was born here in Valkoinen and when he was seven he was apprenticed to a blacksmith in the city of Viima. Viima, like our little town, sat right next to the Atall forest, though Viima was surrounded by Attall on three sides. It was often called the 'City of Sorcery, Sodomy, and Sin' by the rest of the kingdom and many said that the terrors held within Atall was Viima's curse, though Atall had been that way for a century before Viima was even built.

I headed down the street to Andrei's place, glad that Father had given me a reason to go and talk to him. As usual, the pale blond man was outside, feeding his livestock.

"Good afternoon, Nora," he said. "Long time no see." He gave me his funny smile. He had a chipped canine tooth that made it look pointy. I was glad to see him smiling again. He was a bit weird, but he was my only friend. He reminded me a lot of Tino; sweet, quick to laugh, and he had an energy that made him seem younger than he actually was. I usually forgot he was twenty four. Aside from seeing him at the funeral today, it had been at least a year since I last visited him. After Tino became ill, I almost never left the house.

"Hey Andrei," I said, leaning against the fence. "I'd like to buy a chicken from you."

He grinned and ruffled my hair. "Nora, when do I ever charge you for chickens? Which one do you want?" I watched the hens cluck around in their pen, pecking at corn kernels.

"Actually, can I talk to you first? In private." Whenever I had questions that needed answering, Andrei was the man to go to.

"Sure, come on in," he said and swung open the gate. I followed him down the little dirt path into his tiny home. "I'll make us some tea," he said, sliding off into the kitchen.

I sat on the couch and looked around. His home hadn't changed much since I was last here. Hundreds of jars filled with roots and herbs crowded the shelves. It looked like he got a few new spell books. Andrei wasn't a sorcerer. He was a hedge witch. Hedge magic was based in nature. It was different from sorcery in that it was a subtler art, but it played by many of the same rules. Aside from Tino and Emilia, he was the only person who knew that I could do magic. I trusted him with the knowledge years ago and he has kept it a secret ever since.

He walked into the living room and handed me a cup of hot tea.

"Thank you," I said and took a sip. I felt myself totally relax. Andrei always made the best tea. Today he made a mild Kiinalainen tea which he left unstrained. I could see the whole tea leaves at the bottom of the cup, meaning that he would give me a reading later.

"How are you handling it?" I asked. He knew what I meant by 'it,' having cried almost as hard as Emilia. Andrei had been Tino's very first sweetheart. Tino was only thirteen and Andrei was twenty at the time. I was the one who set them up, but it didn't work out. I knew that Andrei cared greatly for Tino, but he was the one who broke it off, saying that there was someone out there that was meant for Tino. It broke both their hearts, but Tino moved on. Andrei never stopped loving him. I told Andrei numerous times that he was idiot for paying greater heed to prophecies read in plants than to his own heart.

Andrei smiled slightly. "I'm handling it about as well as I can. I loved him. Of course, he's a hard person not to love." He sighed. "I just can't believe he's really gone. What about you?" he asked.

"I'm handling it better than I thought I would," I admitted.

"You know, it's okay to cry. I know how much you miss him."

"I do miss him, but I've missed him for an entire year already. I mourned for him when I realized that he would never get better."

"But he's gone now. That is worse from when he was only sick."

I shook my head. "Seeing him suffering like that was so much worse than him being gone. He was so sick and nothing helped him. No matter how much medicine he was given, he just kept getting worse and worse. He's in a better place now. He isn't in anymore pain," I said, repeating the words Elise said to Emilia.

He nodded in agreement. "I supposed you're right."

"I only wish I had the power to save him. I thought Mom dying of the illness was an isolated incident, but once Tino got sick…" I shook my head. "This illness, it can spread. I don't know how, but I worry for mine and Emilia's safety. If I knew how Tino and Mom got it, maybe we could be safe."

Andrei swallowed nervously. "Nora, I… I have a hunch about what may have caused it."

My eyes widened. "What is it?"

"Atall," he said.

"What makes you think that Tino and Mom got the sickness from the forest?"

He took a deep breath. "I get most of my herbs from the edge of the forest and even in broad daylight evil shadows watch the outside world. There is something in those trees, something more dangerous than the Beast. I think whatever is in there is trapped, but if you go in, it can attack you." He bit his lip. "Before your mother died, I was out picking herbs and I saw her walk into the forest. About a week later, she got sick. I didn't make the connection at the time, but a couple years later, I saw Tino go into the forest. It was after your father caught him with Eduard. Tino looked nervous, but he went in anyway. Again, about a week later, he got sick." Andrei grabbed my hand. "Nora, whatever you do, don't go into the forest. I don't know for sure if that's what killed Tino and your mother, but I just know that it's connected somehow. I don't know why they would even go in in the first place."

I could never know the answer to that for sure, but I had a hunch. "Andrei have you ever felt a strange… pull from the forest? Like there is something in there and you just have to go and find it? Do you ever find yourself staring at it like something is calling you?"

He shook his head. "No, never. If it weren't for the herbs, I wouldn't go near that place. I don't even like looking at it. Do you feel that way?" He gave me a worried look.

I nodded. "All the time," I said.

"Nora, whatever is calling you to the forest, don't listen to it. Perhaps your mother and brother felt the same thing. It might have killed them. Promise me that you won't go in."

"I promise," I said. He visibly relaxed.

"Anyway, this isn't what I wanted to talk to you about."

He quirked an eyebrow. "What is it?"

I bit my lip. "Earlier today, my father said something. I don't know if it's true, but it was about my mother."

"What did he say?"

"I might not be his daughter."

"What do you mean?"

"He said that my mother had an affair. Several affairs from the sound of it. He said that he was sure Tino and Emilia are his children because they each bare some resemblance to him, but he said that he sees none of himself in me. Do you know of a way you could find out for me?"

He nodded. "I'm sure I can figure something out. I'll have to look through my spell books first. Could you come back tomorrow?"

I shook my head. "Not tomorrow. I'm meeting Mikkel, remember?"

"Oh right! I forgot about that. Come by after you meet him. I'll have something figured out by then and you can tell me all about your future husband."

I agreed and rested my face in my palms. "I haven't even met him and I already hate his guts. I just bought meat from his idiot father and brother and fuck, I can't believe I'm going to be related to these people."

He put a hand on my shoulder. "Don't be such a worry wart. He might be different from his family."

"Ugh, I already know that he can't write. The letter he sent asking me out to lunch was definitely written by someone else. Either that or he writes like a woman. Even his stupid father is literate, meaning he might actually be dumber than Magnus! And I'm expected to have his children! It's not like I can just cancel this marriage. If I ruin one more betrothal, I think my father might actually kill me."

Andrei chuckled. "Well Nora, if this one falls through, you can always marry me," he teased.

"Mm hm, but what will people say when we've been married ten years and have no children? We can't just tell people you can't get it up for a woman," I teased back.

He tapped his chin in thought. "We could always tell people that my genitals were destroyed in a tragic chicken accident."

I snickered. "Well that's what happens when you get your cock too close to a cock."

"Oh you're bad," he joked. He shook his head. "Nora, what would Mikkel have to be like to be the perfect man for you?"

I thought for a moment. "I don't know. Even if he were perfect, I'll always be distrustful of men. He has to be nice, but not like the bland _'I'm a nice guy and that's my entire personality'_ kind of nice. I just don't want a man who is mean spirited. I don't want him to be smarter than me, or worse, think he's smarter than me, but I don't want him to be dumb as a rock. I'd like him to be funny. If he can make me smile, then bonus points for him. I don't want him to be a creepy pervert. I mean, I don't mind being thought of as beautiful, but I don't want to be an object. Unfortunately, if Mikkel is anything like Magnus or Liam, he's going to be everything I don't want." I laughed bitterly. "I messed up the first marriage, thinking I could do better, but every time I'm betrothed to someone new, they are always somehow worse than the last."

Andrei put his arm around me. "Don't worry Nora. I'm sure everything will work out. Mikkel can't be that bad."

I rolled my eyes. "I wonder if my mother thought the same thing when she was betrothed to my father. I bet she thought he couldn't be 'that bad.' Then she ended up with a man that beat her almost daily and hated her more than anything. Father says she was a whore that cheated on him, and that may be true, but perhaps sleeping around was just her way to escape. I've been able to tolerate my father and his beatings, but I can't take this for the rest of my life. If this continues when I'm married, who knows what I might do. I might just snap and kill my husband." I drained the rest of my tea from the cup. "Anyway, are you going to give me a reading?"

He took my cup from me. "Let's see if we can get you some good news." He swished the contents of the cup around while whispering magic words. The cup glowed a faint green under his power.

"Let's see what we have," he said, peering into the cup. "Hm, an anemone. Something is going to happen next autumn and it's going to be big from the looks of it."

"Good or bad?" I asked. I never understood tea-leaf reading. Once, Andrei tried to teach me the theory of it, but I could never grasp the hundreds of possible symbols and their interpretations.

"Its nature must be judged by the other signs in the cup," he explained. "The anemone is mostly connected with the bat and the buoy, so it could go either way. The bat is an ill omen. Next autumn, sickness and trouble will arise in your home, but the buoy is a symbol of hope. You have true friends who will be there for you through the hard times."

"Who will get sick?"

"Most likely you will, since the buoy indicates that your friends will be there for you."

I frowned. "If I include Emilia, I have two friends." If Tino were alive, he could have been my third friend.

He patted me shoulder. "Make some more friends by autumn and you'll probably be okay. I just hope that it won't be the same illness Tino and your mother had." He looked back into the cup. "On the side of the cup are an ape and a bracelet. There is someone who intends to hurt you, but you will discover their nature too late."

"Mikkel?" I asked.

He shook his head. "I doubt it. It will have to be someone you like and trust initially. You already don't like Mikkel, so I doubt that you have to worry about him."

"Well that narrows the list down quite a bit," I said. "I don't exactly like and trust many people, so it's either you or Emilia."

"It could be someone you don't know yet," he offered. "Be on your guard."

I smirked. "So I have to make friends and be on my guard? This will be interesting."

He rolled his eyes. "Just be careful okay."

"I will. You don't have to worry." I looked at the clock. "I'd better get home, or dinner will be late."

He stood and headed for the door. "Well we certainly don't want that," he said. I followed him outside.

He went into his chicken pen and expertly scooped up a hen. "Remember to come by tomorrow after you meet Mikkel." He handed me the chicken which flapped its wings indignantly. I struggled to hold onto the flailing fowl. "Nora like this," he said, holding the chicken still and showing me where to put my hands. "Hand under the bird, right like that. Hold one leg between your thumb and forefinger and the other between your ring and pinky finger. Keep the wings down with your other hand. Good."

"Thanks," I said with the bird sitting uncomfortably in my hand and my meat basket swinging on the crook of my arm. "I'll talk to you tomorrow Andrei."

"See you later Nora! Have fun with Mikkel!"

"I won't!" I promised.

"Then be on your best behavior," he said.

"I will if he behaves himself first," I retorted.

* * *

**Mikkel**

Long before the sun peeked over the horizon, I was already awake, dressed, and at my workshop. I just couldn't sleep. I had never been so nervous in my life. Only red, slowly waking embers could calm my nerves. Once the coals were hot enough, I stuck an iron rod into the furnace. The tip of the rod heated up, first to a red color, then orange, then a perfect yellow-orange. I pulled the metal out, placed the hot end on the horn of the anvil and tapered the piece into the tip of a nail.

Forty nails later, a sleepy looking Louise walked in. Louise's job was to fill orders for me and handle the money. I wasn't so good with that kind of stuff. I could read numbers, but that was about it. Louise was the one who wrote my letter to Nora a week ago, asking her to lunch.

She yawned. "Mikkel, you're up awfully early. What are you doing?"

"Making nails," I replied.

"Why?"

"Just 'cause," I said bringing my hammer down on one of the glowing hot bastards. Sparks flew when I hit it.

"You're nervous as hell, aren't you?" she said. I dunked the nail in a bucket of water and brought it back out to inspect it.

"I'm not nervous. I don't get nervous. Why would I be nervous?"

She snorted. "You're meeting your future wife who also happens to be Nora, the Ice Princess of Valkoinen."

I set the nail down. "Please don't remind me."

"Shouldn't you be home perfecting your hair and making sure your clothes don't have a single wrinkle? She is going to tear you apart."

I sighed. "Well, if a prince didn't impress her, what makes you think I have any chance?"

Louise nodded in agreement. "Good point. You're pretty much screwed. Did you hear that her brother's funeral was yesterday? She's going to be in a double bad mood."

Fear clawed at my stomach. "Shit, she really is going to tear me apart."

"Why did you even ask to meet her?" she asked.

"Because if I screw this up my old man is gonna kill me. Her father is the richest man in Valkoinen and my father wants some of that money," I explained. "I told him that I didn't want to get married yet and then he goes ahead and decides that I'm going to spend the rest of my life with the most infamous woman in the entire kingdom."

Louise shook her head. "You don't have to worry about that. She's going to break it off with you like she did with the others. Of course, she's going to eat you alive today, but you won't have to see her ever again."

I sighed. "I suppose you're right."

I turned my head when a voice from outside my workshop yelled, "Hey Mikkel! You in there?"

"Yeah!" I yelled back, heading outside. In front of my workshop sat a merchant's caravan; three enormous covered wagons with colorful tent coverings. Alfred was getting out of the driver's seat of the lead wagon. "Hey man!" I said. "You guys heading to market? What do you need?"

Alfred was one of my favorite customers, partially because he was awesome and partially because he paid whatever the silver price was in gold for rush orders. Every time his caravan was heading to market, they always managed to break something and came to me to fix it. The man they worked for was rich enough to afford it, so everybody wins. Though, I always wondered why Alfred brought his caravan to my shop for repairs. Viima was awfully out of the way, no matter where he was coming from. The only way it could be convenient for him would be if he came through Atall, which would be ridiculous.

He jabbed a thumb at the second wagon. "Suspension broke. It's making the goods jostle around. Think you can fix it?"

"Sure I can," I said.

"No you can't!" Louise said, coming out of the forge. She turned to Alfred. "He is meeting his fiancée."

Alfred clapped me on the back. "I didn't know you were getting married. What's she like?"

"I've never met her, but I hear she's a terrifying man eater."

"Oh good luck with that," he said. "So anyway, about the wagon—"

"He can't fix it today," Louise butted in. "Fixing it will be an all day job."

"Louise, it won't take me that long to fix it. It's just a suspension."

"If you do, you will be dirty, sweaty, and late and she's going to kill you."

"I'll pay you eight hundred goldies to fix it," Alfred said.

"Deal!" I said and shook his hand.

"Mikkel!"

"Relax. I can get it done in time."

* * *

I nudged my horse, urging it to go faster. _Shit, shit, shit I was late._ But at least I was eight hundred goldies richer for it. Well, six hundred after Louise got her cut. As the crow flies, Valkoinen was only about two leagues from Viima, but it became five leagues, because you had to go around a branch of the Atall Forest, making it an hour's ride by horse.

After much too long, I saw the outer limits of Valkoinen, my little home town, not that I considered it home. I hadn't lived here since I was seven, when I was apprenticed to Master Luwin, and I only came back on holidays. I greatly preferred the big city feel of Viima. Yes, the city had its problems and many priests called it a 'den of sin,' but as long as you stayed away from the brothels, then it seemed like any ordinary city, albeit one filled with a lot more accepting people. That was something I didn't like about Valkoinen, or really, any other place in the kingdom. People seemed to hate one another for little, stupid things. Just the other day, I heard something about a couple of sorcerers, convicted of supposedly cursing people, being hung in the capital. That sort of thing would never happen in Viima, which was probably why it was one of the greatest magical powers in the kingdom. Magically gifted people flocked to places where persecution was highly prohibited.

I rode up to a large house that looked like the right place. I hopped off my horse, ran up to the door, and knocked. My heart thudded in my chest. _Shit, I was dirty, sweaty, and late. Was this even the right house? Oh god, what if it wasn't? Was I supposed to bring flowers for her? Fuck, I was supposed to bring flowers for her wasn't I?_

I jumped at the sound of the door being unlocked. It opened and my eyes widened when I saw her. I knew that this was the right place. That angelic face was definitely beautiful enough to capture the heart of a prince and then stomp on it.

"Y-You're Nora?" I stuttered. She nodded. Her eyes were wide. She probably thought I looked like a hobo. "I'm Mikkel. I'm sorry I'm so late. Some last minute work came up and I lost track of time."

She shook her head. "That's okay, I was running a bit late too. Come on in. We'll leave in a bit. I just have to finish cleaning up the kitchen."

I was shocked by how human she seemed. The rumors had led me to believe that she was a haughty, stuck up bitch who didn't feel things like basic human empathy. Maybe that was wrong.

I walked over the threshold, taking my hat off because I had to try being a gentleman. My foot caught on the door stop and I found myself falling through empty air. I crashed face first into her floor. _Great first impression Mikkel,_ I heard Louise's voice say. _Now she thinks you're a dirty, clumsy, oaf._

"Oh my god! Are you okay?" she asked, bending over me. "Oh you have a nasty cut on your forehead. Let's get that cleaned up." She helped me up off the floor. _Was this really the same woman they called the Ice Princess?_

In the kitchen, she had me sit on a stool as she dabbed a wet cloth over the cut. Her deep blue eyes were filled with genuine concern. _God she was beautiful_. She whispered something so quietly that I barely heard her, but I realized that she was saying a spell for healing.

"You can do magic," I said. She looked shocked and like she was going to deny it. "That's so cool. You're a sorceress. I never expected a girl from Valkoinen to know magic."

She gave me a confused look. "I'm not really a sorceress. I don't know many spells. Just the ones in my grandmother's spell books. I'm surprised you didn't freak out and call me a devil. That's what most people around here do when they see magic."

I grinned, realizing I found a way to get on her good side. "I'm pretty used to sorcerers. There are hundreds of them in Viima. I recognize that spell, actually. Master Luwin, the guy who taught me blacksmithing, used to use it whenever I burnt myself. Well, he wasn't a sorcerer. He just dabbled in all different kinds of magic. Called himself a hedge witch, but he didn't use enough plants to really be considered one. Just today, I fixed a wagon for a group of sorcerers. That's why I was late actually."

"You know real sorcerers?" she asked, very intrigued.

I nodded. "Yeah, they're a group that goes to market in Punainen to sell all sorts of magical stuff. They usually pass through town to get something fixed, because without fail, something on their caravan breaks. Alfred is the guy I usually talk to, and occasionally his wife Sakura. Don't know much about the other two in their group, but Alfred and Sakura are nice people. Sakura's main thing is fortune-telling and she's pretty spot on accurate. I have no idea what Alfred's specialty is, but I've seen him do a couple spells. He says his mother is a master of potions. Next time they come through town, I could introduce them to you."

Her eyes twinkled as stars in the velvet night sky and she smiled the most beautiful smile I'd ever seen. "I'd like that." I felt my heart pound in my chest. _Was this a promise to see her again? Would this actually work out?_

* * *

We ended up going to the local tavern which was one of the few places to eat out in this little town. The tavern was mostly empty at this time of day except for a few travelers and a couple hard drinkers. When we ordered I was happy to see her order the same kind of ale I liked. _Yay, we had something in common._

"So tell me about yourself," I said. "I've done most of the talking. About all I know about you is that you're a sorc—"

She slapped a hand over my mouth. "Don't say it here," she said, a worried look on her face as she glanced around to make sure no one was listening. "I tried whispering the spell as quietly as possible. You weren't supposed to hear, but luckily you are open-minded about this sort of thing. It's not something that people are very kindly about here."

I sighed. "I'm sorry, I forget that this isn't Viima. People here are so strange."

She nodded. "I know very few people who are okay with sorcery. My own sister despises it, but she is kind enough to not say anything about it. If she did, I'd probably be put in jail."

My eyes widened. "What? That's insane. Valkoinen isn't even the harshest town for that. I'd expect that kind of thing from like, the capital or something, but they're crazy there."

She narrowed her eyes at me. "You are originally from here. How do not know this?"

"I may have been born in Valkoinen," I told her. "But I've been a citizen of Viima since I was seven. I only came back here on holidays. I knew that my family had vastly different beliefs than what I was taught in Viima, but I thought it was because they were always close minded. Apparently everyone here is that way. Persecuting sorcerers. That's ridiculous. What, do people here persecute sodomy too?" I asked, sarcastically.

"Actually, yes. Please keep your voice down. Depending on what you are accused of, you can either be put in bedlam, jail, or be hung."

I choked on my drink. "What?"

She nodded and whispered, "Personally, I think it's insane too, but that because my brother was a sodomite and I know that there was nothing wrong with him. When he was caught kissing another man, that man's father threatened to have my brother hung on grounds of seduction. Luckily, my brother was friends with literally everyone in town and any attempt to hurt him would have resulted in a mob, so the whole thing was hushed up."

I took a swig of ale. "Yeah, I'm never moving away from Viima," I told her. I wondered if this brother of hers was the one that died. She did talk about him in the past tense.

She bit her lip. "Do… do you think that when we're, you know, married, that I'll be able to find someone in Viima to teach me sorcery?"

My eyes widened. She just said 'when we're married.' _This was actually going to happen?_

"Of course," I said. "If you want, I can start looking for a teacher for you."

Her eyes brightened. "You would do that?"

I nodded. "It would be my pleasure."

She smiled. "So what is it like living in Viima?"

"It's a great city. It's nothing like the propaganda from what other cities say about it. Just stay away from the brothels because you'll get mugged. Other than that, it's probably the freest city in the world. The worst thing about it is that it's bordered by Atall on three sides. My house literally sits just outside of the tree line. When you stare into the forest at night, it stares back with thousands of glowing eyes. You should hear the noises that come out of that place at night. Just the other night at about three, I was awoken by the most monstrous roar. You know how there are so many people who have claimed to have seen the Beast, but they all have a different description of it? I think that there isn't one Beast. I think there's many. I talked to my older brother Liam the other day. You probably know Liam. He's big and creepy and he works at the butcher shop here."

She smirked at my description of him. "Yes, I know Liam."

"Anyway, apparently this kid ran into the forest, in the middle of night no less, and my brother and some other guys were sent to look for the body. They didn't find the boy, but my brother claims the Beast bit his hand off. He says it—"

"Was a hound," she finished. "Believe me. He told me." Her eyes were dark.

"Are you okay?" I asked. _Shit, did I piss her off already? Well I lasted longer than I thought I would._

"It's nothing," she said sternly. She looked away from me and her lips were sealed into a tight line.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to offend you."

She took a deep breath. "I'm fine. It's just… the boy who ran into the forest… he's my brother."

My eyes widened. "Oh my god, I'm so sorry. I didn't know."

"It's okay. You couldn't have known. And it's not even what you said. Liam kept talking about how the Beast ate Tino."

"May I ask why he would run into the forest?"

She shrugged. "He probably didn't know what he was doing because he was very sick. It wouldn't have made a difference if he had stayed. He was going to be dead within a day anyway. Nothing could cure him."

I placed my hand over her. "He's in a better place now," I said. I wished I had something better, more profound, to say than that, but what else can you say in a situation like this.

Nora smiled sadly. "Sometimes, I wonder if there really is a 'better place.'"

* * *

**Nora**

I knocked hurriedly on Andrei's door, hoping he'd open up quickly. It was only six in the evening, but night had already fallen and it was freezing cold.

He opened the door and I felt warmth spill out into the frosty air. "Come in, before all the heat gets out," he said, ushering me inside. He sat next to me on the couch. "So how did it go?"

"He… he surprised me," I admitted. "Pleasantly. He figured out pretty quickly that I know magic and he actually knew what the spell I used was for."

Andrei raised a brow in question.

"He tripped over my doorstop and bashed his head on the floor," I explained. "And I barely whispered the spell, thinking that if he caught me, I could just say that I was talking to myself, but he identified it as a healing spell right away. He said that there are lots of sorcerers in Viima and he actually offered to look for someone to teach me!"

"Really? A Kohler who supports sorcery?" Andrei looked doubtful.

I smirked. "You were the one who told me to give him a chance because he might be different from his family," I said.

He shook his head in disbelief. "Yeah, but I didn't think he'd be _that_ different. Are you in love with him now?" he teased.

I rolled my eyes. "He received an A+ for the first impression, but I'll wait until he shows his true colors to answer that question. I get the feeling that like me, he was on his best behavior."

"So you do plan on seeing him again? Nora for you, that's like you're already married to him."

"Oh shut up." I playfully smacked his arm. "Anyway, did you look up a way to find out if Father is my real father?"

He nodded and picked a green, leather-bound spell book off the coffee table. He flipped open to a bookmarked page. "This spell will make your blood related parents and full-blooded siblings break out in a rash on their neck."

I raised an eyebrow. "That's not weird at all."

He shrugged. "That's just what it does, and the rash goes away after thirty minutes, so we won't have to worry about freaking your sister out."

"I suppose we should wait until my father comes back from Punainen to do it," I said.

He nodded. "That will work. What will you do if you find out he isn't your father?"

"I don't think it will change a thing, but I'll know the truth. I feel like I don't know anything right now and I feel so powerless, but the more I know, the more I will be in control of my own future."

* * *

Can I just say that Nora is a really freaking hard character to write. Everything that involves her has to be rewritten at least twice and I'm still never satisfied with how she turns out. Also, I'd like to take this moment to note that after Nora is beaten and she reveals that she makes a game out of it, I am not making light of child abuse. Turning years of abuse into a game is an actual defense mechanism that allows the victim to feel like they are in control. Just wanted to put that out there.

I did a lot of research for this chapter that left me with some strange browsing history. The tea-leaf symbols that Andrei reads are real, and those interpretations are exactly what they mean. And I found a hilarious forum for people who own pet chickens when I looked up "how to hold a chicken properly."

Please review, especially since I'm kind of iffy on how this chapter turned out.

Until next time,

~Firewolf


	6. Chapter 5: Rising Darkness

Hey everyone, I'm so sorry about how long this chapter took. I didn't mean for this to be a three and a half month hiatus, but this chapter was a butt kicker to write, plus I've been home for the summer and I write best when I'm at school. Thank you to CopperKitsune for suggesting a name for Tino's father. His name is Heikki. I'm going to shut up now and let you read.

* * *

Chapter 5—Rising Darkness

The streets of Punainen bustled with activity as it always did this time of year. This mid-sized city, built into the red stone of the Verian Mountains, annually hosted Market Week and attracted traders and customers from all over the known world. During this week, the population swelled to over three million people and the temporary businesses overflowed into the surrounding highlands to accommodate everyone.

With Market Week being on its final day, the streets became less crowded due to customers not being as hurried to buy and some vendors leaving early to avoid the traffic jam that occurred every year. Most people however, stayed, for on the last night of Market Week, after all the vendors had closed their shops, the city held a large festival attended by both customers and merchants. The Market Week festival was one of the most popular events in the world. Nowhere else did people gather in the millions and have enough food to satisfy them and enough drink to keep them merry. But Punainen was a rich city due to this centuries-long tradition, and they were well prepared to entertain everyone.

In a tent in the heart of the city, Emilia Vainamoinen, a pretty young girl of fourteen years, stood on a stool as a seamstress double checked the length on her dress. As the festival was a formal event, guests were expected to wear evening attire. Emilia had chosen her evening gown earlier in the week from this vendor, but due to her short stature, the fabric had to be tailored.

Emilia couldn't hold back her smile. "It's perfect," she proclaimed. The seamstress gave her a satisfied nod and began helping the girl out of the long robes.

The robe-like garment was exactly what she had wanted, a traditional Kiinalainen style of clothing called a hanfu. It had long, flowing sleeves that covered her hands when she kept her arms straight and a plain white sash tied around her waist to secure the robes. A blue floral design patterned the outer robe.

The seamstress folded the dress and placed it in a cardboard box while Emilia put on her regular clothes. She could barely contain her glee at being able to wear one of those beautiful Kiinalainen gowns. For a western girl like her, one with wide blue eyes, porcelain skin, and such light blonde hair it was nearly white, it was a bit strange to wear a gown in this style, but she didn't care. She had been fascinated by that mysterious eastern country ever since she was a child.

Someday she would travel to Kiina. She knew in her heart she would. Though Emilia was a quiet and serious girl who seemed to have no patience for frivolity, Emilia secretly craved adventure and romance. She wanted something exciting to happen, but for now, it seemed that the only exciting thing that would be happening would be the festival, and she wouldn't even have her brother to be there with her. A lump formed in her throat knowing this was the first Market Week festival she'd attend without Tino.

_Would the festival even be fun without him?_ she wondered as she finished buttoning her coat over her dress. Slinging her purse over her shoulder, she left the dressing room. She actually wished Nora had come with them. Though she and her sister didn't see eye-to-eye on a lot of things, and despite the fact that Nora always sucked the fun out of everything, Nora would have been more preferable company at a party than her dad, who would bite the head off of any man who asked her to dance. Her dad had always been over protective and he annoyed Emilia to no end.

At a small table near the entrance to the tent, the merchant in charge slipped the box that held the gown into a satin bag and handed it to Emilia. She thanked the man as she paid for the gown and the tailoring fee, then left the tent.

As Emilia stepped out of the tent she shielded her eyes from the bright morning sun. The sun was warm on her face but the winter wind that blew through the mountains was bone chilling. It was the dead of winter but there was no snow on the ground. Her dad had explained that it was too dry in the Verian Mountains, but it still seemed strange for it to be this cold and not see snow.

She walked along the red cobblestone street, trying to decide on what to do next. She didn't want to head back to the inn yet because she'd end up just sitting around for the next ten hours, so she settled on wandering around. She had seen most of the shops in this part of the city already, so she started walking toward the outskirts of the city.

It didn't take long for her surroundings to become unfamiliar. She had drifted onto a street with only a few other people and no tents. For a few panicked seconds, she thought she had gotten lost, but then she turned a corner and saw more of the colorful market tents farther down the road.

The market was organized by the type of goods that were being sold. One section sold unique and exotic food, another sold clothes, and another held all of the jewelry vendors. But Emilia didn't see any signs saying which section was ahead of her.

A couple of guards in red uniforms stood post in front of the entrance. As she passed she slowed to ask one of them what was in this section, but she was startled by the nasty glare the man sent her and she hurried away, wondering what his problem was. She did not hear the man hiss the word 'witch' under his breath.

The tents were arranged in a small semi-circle, numbering ten in all. She poked her head into the first stall to get an idea of what was being sold here and she recoiled in fright. She slapped a hand over her mouth to keep herself from making a sound. Inside the tent were shelves upon shelves of jars. Most seemed be just ordinary jars that weren't filled with anything sinister, but some contained preserved animal parts (at least, she hoped those were just animal parts and nothing human,) while others glowed with unnatural light.

To her horror, she realized that she had wandered into the section selling magical items. She almost felt like smacking herself as she realized why guards were stationed at the entrance. They were making sure that these vendors didn't sell anything really illegal. While all forms of magic were technically outlawed in the kingdom, Punainen had special trading laws that allowed the sale of magic supplies and magically produced items as long as they weren't certain blacklisted services such as curses, demon deals, magical weapons, and so on.

She began walking back toward the exit, determined to get out as quickly as possible when a thought crossed her mind. _How bad could it be to take a peek?_ She turned to get a good look at the place. None of the people around her seemed particularly shady. If she hadn't already looked into a tent, she never would have guess that this section was different from any other in the city.

_Just looking won't hurt anything,_ she decided as curiosity got the best of her. She gave the first couple tents a quick peek, but didn't go in because they were filled with things she didn't find interesting or didn't understand.

In the fifth tent sat an old woman (who looked old enough to remember the dawn of mankind) knitting a pair of socks at a makeshift checkout counter. This shop seemed much more promising because the woman was selling books and books would always catch Emilia's interest.

"Welcome to my shop," the woman croaked. She set down her knitting and stood up. Emilia winced at the popping of the woman's joints as she walked around the table. "How may I help you?"

"Uh… I'm just browsing, I guess. What kinds of books do you have?" she asked, then immediately felt stupid. The old witch probably wasn't selling cook books.

"Well, I've got a beginner's manual for pretty much anything you'd want to study. And on the shelf on the far left I've got a bunch of general spell books that cover pretty much all the bases, but those are useful only if you've been using magic for a while. Do you have any experience with magic?" she asked.

Emilia shook her head. "No, I've never used magic before," she told the woman. But as she said this, an idea came to her. "However, I might buy one of those for my older sister. She only has a couple spell books that our granny gave to her. What would you recommend?" she asked.

"What kind of magic does your sister use?"

"Um… just sorcery, I guess," Emilia said. The woman nodded and hobbled over to the bookshelf, Emilia following.

She couldn't believe she was doing this. Was she actually planning to buy a spell book? Her dad would be livid if he found out, but the very idea of going against him sent a thrill through her spine.

The woman ran a boney finger over the spines of leather bound books. Emilia shivered. Though her hands were tiny and frail, Emilia could feel that this hunched, arthritic woman possessed unnatural strength. She could feel power emanating from her and the girl briefly entertained the idea of having that kind of presence, before squashing the thought. _No_, she told herself, _leave deliberately spitting in Dad's face to Nora._

The old woman's finger came to rest over one particularly thick volume and pulled it off the shelf. She flipped through a few pages, nodding to herself, then she snapped it shut and handed it to Emilia.

"This should do the trick, sweetheart," she said. "It covers everything from cooking and cleaning to healing and self-defense."

Emilia flipped to the back cover to look for a price, dreading how much a book this size would cost, and was surprised to find it only cost twelve silvers. She stared in confusion at the price tag, wondering how the book could be so cheap. She opened to a random page and found nothing amiss. It had been bound using high quality parchment and the scribe who penned the spells had top notch penmanship.

"Ma'am, why does this cost so little?" she asked. "Is this some sort of trick?"

The old woman snorted. "No tricks, sweetheart. I use magic to write my books. Makes the production costs a lot lower."

"I see," she said, cradling the book in her arms and heading back to the front table with the woman following behind. "Well, I will definitely buy this. Twelve silvers is a steal." She set the book down on the table and counted out the number of coins she owed as the woman wrapped the heavy tome in thin colorful paper.

"I'm sure your sister will love this," the woman chatted and took the money from Emilia.

Emilia placed the book in the satin bag with her gown. "I hope so. Have a nice day," she said, turning to leave.

"Wait a second sweetheart," the woman said. Emilia turned back to the woman.

"Your sister uses magic, but you said you've never used magic before, correct?" she asked.

"Yes," Emilia said, nodding.

"If you have any interest in the magical arts, I can do a test to see what field of magic would come most naturally to you. I've taught magic for more than sixty years and most of the books I'm selling here are for beginners. If you want to learn magic, I could point you in the right direction and I'm sure your sister could give you help if you needed it."

Emilia felt a bit of panic creep into her heart. She was fine with buying a spell book for Nora, but learning magic herself would be going too far. _What's the worst that could happen? _a part of her wondered, but though she was being a rebel today, she would not completely disobey her dad just to satisfy her curiosity.

She shook her head and gave the best excuse she could think of. "No thank you ma'am, but I don't have any magic power, so I doubt that any kind of magic would come naturally to me."

The old woman gave a snorting sort of laugh that told Emilia she had said something stupid.

"Dear, anyone is capable of doing magic," she said. "And if your sister can do it, you would most certainly be able to do it as well."

"Oh," Emilia said, feeling really stupid. "I don't know much about magic, because well… my dad hates magic and sorcerers. He'd probably kill me if he found out I was here."

"I see. I'll be sure not to tell him you were here," the old woman said with a wink. "But it is a shame that you are prevented from having a basic understanding of magic. Even if you decide not to pursue magic, a little general knowledge never hurts."

"I suppose you're right," Emilia said, resigning herself to hearing the old woman out.

"The first thing you must know is that there are two broad categories of magic that were not creatively named: Common Magic and Rare Magic," she began. "Rare Magic is something you have to be born with and as you might have guessed, not many people have it. But anyone can do Common Magic. There are two classes of Common Magic: Low and High Magic. Low Magic, which includes hedge magic and fortune telling, is useful for only a handful of simple, everyday problems but it does not require a large amount of power nor a lifetime of study to be successful.

"On the other hand," she continued. "High Magic takes many, many years to master and a great amount of power is necessary, but it is far more useful than Low Magic. There are two forms of High Magic: sorcery and witchcraft, both of which are very complex. Sorcery is especially complicated because it has over thirty distinctly different sub-fields, such as the nature magic, potions, enchantments, blood magic, demon magic, etc."

"Demon magic?" Emilia asked, a worried look on her face. She definitely did not want to be involved with anything that used demons.

"Don't worry about it, sweetheart," the woman said, smirking. "Demon magic was outlawed by the Council of High Magic a century ago. Too many of its practitioners went insane."

"Why?" she asked.

The old woman shrugged. "I suppose trying to control pure evil beings would wear at the mind."

"What about the other fields?" Emilia asked.

"Which ones did I mention again?" she asked, scratching her chin in thought. "Oh yes… There are seven types of nature magic: plants, animals, earth, water, wind, fire, and weather. Potions are fairly self-explanatory. Enchantments are spells that causes something to be permanently changed. Blood magic, though it sounds dark, is just magic related to medicine. There are many more fields than that but don't concern yourself too much with it. Unless you were born as the heir to some powerful lineage of sorcerers, it's unlikely that you would ever reach this level, but that's okay. You don't need to completely master sorcery for it to be useful. The test I use to see a person's magical aptitude doesn't even go that in depth. It only tests to see if you would be better at say, hedge magic vs. witchcraft. So are you interested at all in the test?" she asked, giving Emilia an expectant look.

Emilia sighed. "How much does it cost?"

The woman shook her head. "I wouldn't charge for the test. Only if you decided to buy a book would it cost you anything."

Emilia shrugged. "Okay, I guess it couldn't hurt to find out," she said. "What do you want me to do?"

The woman gave her a wrinkly smile. "Just stand right where you are dear," she said and placed her hand over Emilia's forehead. She closed her eyes and whispered in a strange, fluid sounding language. As she spoke, a green light emanated from beneath her skin.

A curious look appeared on her face as she removed her hand. "Strange," she whispered to herself. Then she gave a small chuckle. "I suppose I should have explained Rare Magic to you as well," she said.

"I have Rare Magic?" Emilia asked, her eyes widening in surprise.

The old woman nodded. "Rare Magic is something that a select few are born with, but those people only have a small amount of power until they develop it. It has its advantages and disadvantages. For instance, gaining power is much easier for Rare Magic users than it is for Common Magic users, so they can become vastly more powerful in a fraction of the time. In addition, Rare Magic takes much less time to master. The disadvantage is that there are several hundred types of Rare Magic, you are only born with one, and each one is good for only one, single task. For instance, you could be born with a power that gives you the ability to fly, or heal the sick, or turn invisible. Or you could get stuck with glowing in the dark, or making other people hallucinate odors. It's luck of the draw."

She saw the questioning look Emilia gave her. "Yes, those are real, documented powers. Those poor bastards," she said shaking her head. "Anyway, the other downside of having Rare Magic is that you are much more prone to fainting when your store of power is exhausted. Common Magic users only have this problem if they've been under a lot of stress or if they use up all their power in one shot."

"So, what kind do I have?" Emilia asked.

"Spirit magic," she answered. "And lucky for you, it is one of the most common types of Rare Magic, so I've been able to do tons of research on it. Plus its uses are so versatile that many people consider it to be halfway between Rare and Common Magic." She got up from her chair and walk to a shelf. After a moment of searching, she plucked a thin book off the shelf and handed it to Emilia.

Emilia looked at the cover. It said 'A Beginner's Guide to Spirit Magic,' and underneath the title was a picture of a young child with an enormous, transparent bear looming over him. She flipped through the first couple of pages, seeing section titles like 'What is Spirit Magic?', 'Accessing Your Power for the First Time', and 'Summoning Your Spirit Animal.'

At thirty pages long, it was less of a book and more of a pamphlet, but it only cost fifty coppers. Emilia figured she could afford to waste that much, but did she really want to do this? It was one thing to buy that book for Nora. Doing that wasn't so much a rebellion on her part as it was enabling Nora to rebel the way she always did. But delving into magic herself would be going far beyond disobedience and unlike Nora, she had little practice keeping secrets from her dad.

_Dad will surely find out, _she thought. She didn't know what he'd do, but she knew that it wouldn't be pleasant.

"You don't have to buy it if you don't want to," the old woman said and Emilia realized that she had been grimacing at the booklet for a while.

"Oh I sorry," she said, shaking her head. "I'm just thinking. My dad would be so furious if he found out I bought this. I don't know what I should do."

The woman raised an eyebrow. "Do you want it?" she asked.

"Well yes, but—"

"Then get it. Don't let opportunities pass you by because you are afraid of angering someone else. Whatever you decide, make sure that it is your decision."

Emilia mulled this over in her head. _If I completely leave my dad out of my decision, how do I feel about this?_ She still felt wary of magic, but at the same time, the idea of being powerful was too attractive to pass up. "I'll buy it."

* * *

Emilia reached the inn as the bells in the center plaza chimed noon. She climbed the stairs to the suite she and her dad shared, her frozen cheeks thawing in the fire warmed air. The door creaked when she stepped into the small common area that sat between hers and her dad's rooms.

"Dad, are you here?" she called out to ensure that he had not returned. When she received no answer, she breathed a sigh of relief and went to her room. She removed her dress from the satin bag, admiring it for a moment, then she hung it up in her closet. Next, she pulled out her forbidden purchases and hid the book for Nora in the nightstand by her bed. The one for her, she placed on her bed to be read in a moment. First, she had to light the fireplace as the cold was seeping through her clothes.

Her hands shook as she tried to light the match. _What am I doing?_ she wondered. _Am I really going to learn magic just because some old witch told me I have a gift for it? _She took a breath to steady her hands. She was no longer afraid of her father finding out. It wasn't fear that caused her hands to shake. It was anticipation.

Finally, the match lit and when the kindling burned strongly, she set a log over it. Watching the fire take hold of the wood, consuming it, helped to calm Emilia's nerves. She sat down on her bed and held the small book, running her hand over it. It was filled with so many secrets and it was all hers. She knew that she could not back away from this now, not when she had so much forbidden knowledge right at her fingertips.

Emilia flipped open to the first page and began to read.

* * *

It took her less than an hour to read the whole book, cover to cover, twice. She wanted to ensure that she wasn't entering into any sort of devil's bargain but the book made no mention of demons, except to say that spirit magic was not conducive to exorcising demons. It did say that there is a sort of contract between a spirit magic user and their spirit animal. A spirit animal will provide its master with its eons worth of knowledge, while the master provides the raw power.

Emilia took a deep breath before returning to the page with the summoning spell. She read it out loud a few times to make sure her pronunciation was correct, then she practiced searching for her power the way the book instructed her. She was supposed to focus on a color, the first color that came to mind. For her, this was white. Then the book instructed 'take a walk in your mind and search for an object that sticks out to you.' As she 'walked' through some imagined corridor, she came upon a glowing white feather sitting on a stone bench. She picked it up and was surprised at how heavy the feather was. The white light moved from the feather to her hand and then up her arm, over her chest, down her legs, until her entire body was enveloped in the light. Her body felt weightless like she could float away in a soft breeze, but her heart felt sturdy and solid as it pounded in her chest.

She opened her eyes with that strong, powerful feeling remaining in her body as she said the summoning spell.

"Nenu khagola svargam nunci na atma jantu piluvu."

_I summon my spirit animal from the celestial heavens._

Though the room was warm, her breath came out in white puffs as though the air was freezing. She waited and waited, but nothing happened except that she felt very tired. Frustrated and suddenly too exhausted to try again, she threw the book across the room. It clattered down somewhere in the closet. She huffed and flopped down onto her bed, face down in the pillow. Exhaustion washed over her, pulling her down into sleep, where she couldn't be disappointed.

* * *

She awoke to a hand on her shoulder gently shaking her.

"Emilia honey, wake up," her dad's voice whispered. She scrunched her eyes shut and stretched. When she sat up, she noticed that her room had darkened considerably since she had fallen asleep.

"Dad, what time is it?" she asked.

"Half past six," he answered.

"Oh no!" she cried, leaping across the room to grab a hair brush off the dresser. She ran the brush through her soft hair. "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to sleep that long. I'll get ready as fast as possible. I got my dress today. It's so perfect!"

Her father said nothing. She turned around to see him sitting on her bed, hands clasped together like he was praying. "Dad?"

"I'm afraid we will not be attending tonight's festival," he said quietly.

Emilia gave him a confused look. "What?"

He cleared his throat and spoke louder. "We cannot go to the festival tonight."

She slammed her brush onto the dresser. "What do you mean we can't go!" she snarled, making him wince.

"Something came up," was his vague answer.

She glared at him and crossed her arms. "What. Came. Up?"

"I have to meet with someone."

"Then reschedule."

He shook his head. "No Emilia, I can't do that. This meeting is of grave importance."

She huffed. "Fine. Then you can go to your stupid meeting and I'll go to the festival on my own."

"No you will not. You're coming with me," he said.

"Why?"

"Because I'm supposed to bring you with me."

"I don't want to. You can go to your super important meeting and I'll go to the festival."

"Don't make me force you to come with me, little girl!" he yelled, standing to full height. Emilia was not impressed considering that she was four inches taller than him. She stepped up to her father and glared down at him.

"I am not a little girl," she said. "I am fourteen years old and you can't force me to do anything! You let Tino go to the festival on his own when he was my age."

"Yes, that was a mistake on my part. He came home so drunk that he didn't remember anything the next day. I'm not going to let you do the same thing."

Emilia rolled her eyes. "Dad, I don't even like alcohol. And I'm way more mature than Tino is."

"Was," he corrected. "It doesn't matter how mature you are. You are not going and that's final."

She stormed to her closet and pulled out her dress. "I already have something to wear. You can't stop me from going!"

"Give me the dress," he ordered, holding out his hand.

"No."

"Emilia, you are trying my patience," he said, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Give me the dress."

"I said, no. I'm going to the festival with or without you."

"Don't make me ask again," he said with a warning look in his eyes.

She held the dress close to her. "Just go to your stupid meeting!" she yelled, glaring at him.

He made a grab at the dress, catching it by one of the sleeves. "Let go!" Emilia growled, trying to release it from his grip.

"Give it to me!" he ground out through clenched teeth. He gripped the collar and pulled as hard as he could while Emilia pulled in the opposite direction. The awful sound of fabric ripping filled the air as Emilia fell back onto the floor. She held her half of the torn dress in stunned silence.

"Emilia, I—" her father said, realizing what he had done and trying to apologize. His voice shook her from her frozen state.

"Get out," she said in a low voice. He dropped his half of the dress and tried to put a comforting hand on her shoulder but she smacked it away. "Get out!" She got off the floor and opened the door for him. "Leave me alone." Tears began to pool in her eyes and she didn't want to cry in front of him.

"Emilia—"

"You're ruining my life!" she screamed at him. "I hate you!"

When he didn't leave she ran across the room, picked up her hair brush, and chucked it at him. It hit him directly above his right eye. He moved closer to the door but he still didn't leave. She threw pens, books, and jars of makeup at him. Then, she picked up a porcelain mug and hurled it at him. He dodged and the mug shattered on the wall behind him.

"You are way out of line little girl!" he yelled, storming up to her and slapping her. She pressed a hand to her stinging cheek in shock. He had never, ever hit her before.

"Did you just slap me?" she screamed. The hatred and hurt were plain to see on her face. She pushed him out of her room. "Get away from me! I hate you!" She slammed the door behind him and locked it.

He slammed his fist again the door. "Emilia, open this door right now!" he ordered.

"Why, so you can hit me some more?" she retorted. "I'm never, ever talking to you again!"

"Fine. Stay in there and mope. I don't care. I will leave in an hour. You can either come with me or sulk for the rest of the night." His footsteps trailed off to another part of the suite.

Emilia picked up the pieces of her dress and sat on her bed. Salty tears slid down her face and a sob caught in her throat. She cried into the fabric of her dress as the last rays of sunlight disappeared behind the mountains.

* * *

The clock in the plaza chimed seven thirty.

"Emilia, I'm leaving now," her father said through the door. "Are you coming?" She stayed silent and he sighed. "I'll be back by midnight," he said. The creaky door opened and closed and she was alone.

She flipped over and glared at the ceiling. If she hadn't pulled out her dress and flaunted it, maybe she could have gone. But now she had nothing to wear and even if she had time to fix her dress, the fabric was too shredded to attempt sewing it back together. It was ruined for good. A few more tears squeezed out of her eyes. She wished Tino was with her, or Nora.

Noise from early birds arriving at the festival reached her ears. She smacked her face against her pillow, sobbing.

"Everything is stupid!" she cried, and threw the dress across the room.

The noise got louder as a band of musicians began warming up. She sighed and sat up, looking through her window at the streets below. People were already dancing and having fun. This was like torture. The inn stood in the plaza where all the main events were being held so she'd be able to watch all the fun from the solitude of her room.

* * *

With a flap of his wings he landed on the wooden floor of an inn. A young girl lay on the bed crying, though it was too dark in the room for him to see her well. She looked up, having heard his arrival and stared at him for a moment.

The girl sniffled, then gave a short laugh. "How'd you get in here, weird little bird?" she asked.

"Who are you calling weird?" he asked in a grouchy voice. The sound of his voice startled the girl into throwing her pillow at him. He squawked indignantly as the pillow passed through its body like he was made of air. "What the hell was that for?"

"Oh god, it talked. I'm going insane. I'm imagining talking birds," the girl panicked and started rocking back and forth.

"Hold on a second girly," he said. "You summoned me, didn't you?"

Her eyes widened in understanding. "You're a spirit animal," she said. He nodded. "Wait but I called you hours ago."

He shrugged. "It always takes that long to reach the spirit world your first time. So what's your name, girly?"

"Emilia," she answered. "You?"

"You may call me Mr. Puffin. It's a pleasure," he said, trying to be as polite as possible, though the words sounded unnatural coming from him. But, this was his first master in nearly three hundred years, and he didn't want Emilia to turn out like the last one. "Why are you crying?" he asked.

She wiped her eyes. "I wanted to go to the festival, but my dad ripped my dress in half so I can't go." She looked so woeful about it that Mr. Puffin wanted to smack her. He had to remind himself that she was just a kid and this was probably the worst thing that had ever happened to her.

"That was shitty of him," he said in his best attempt to comfort her.

Emilia nodded, but then she perked up when an idea seemed to come to her. "Mr. Puffin! Would you be able to fix my dress? Like with magic?"

He raised an eyebrow. "What do I look like, your fairy godmother?" he asked, but Emilia gave him her biggest puppy dog eyes. The spirit animal sighed. "Fine, where's the dress?"

With renewed excitement, Emilia hopped off her bed and picked the dress off the floor. She arranged the pieces in front of him.

"I'm just going to warn you, this will make you feel a bit tired since you haven't done anything to develop your power," he said.

Emilia nodded. "That's fine."

Mr. Puffin sighed and chanted a quick spell, while Emilia stared intently at the shredded fabric. Before her very eyes, the mangled threads connected and pulled themselves back together until the dress was good as new. He could see her sag slightly at the power drain, but she grinned widely and scooped Mr. Puffin off the floor.

"Thank you Mr. Puffin! You're amazing!" she sang, hugging the soft bird to her chest.

Mr. Puffin cleared his throat in annoyance. "Are you done?" he asked. With one last giggle, Emilia set him on the bed and picked her dress off the floor. It fluttered behind her as she ran to the bathroom.

"Since I'm going to the festival, I should probably think of a fake name," she mused. Her voice echoed a bit behind the door.

"Why in the world would you do that?" Mr. Puffin asked.

"If I run into someone who knows my dad, I don't want them to tell him that I was at the festival," she explained.

Mr. Puffin felt confused. "How would a fake name help?" he wondered, but he could tell that Emilia wasn't listening to him.

"I think Ella sounds like a good name, don't you?"

"Sure," he responded, rolling his eyes. "Hey girly," he said. Emilia poked her head out of the bathroom.

"Yes?" she asked. Mr. Puffin could see that she had already managed to put on part of her dress and as he spoke, her hands were busy getting the rest of it on.

"Since you're my master now, I'm kind of required to explain how all this works. You know, like how you're supposed to summon me, what I can do for you, how you develop your power, etc."

"Okay," she said as she finished tying her robes, obviously only half listening. "How long will it take?"

He sighed. He never did this. Normally, he'd sit her butt down and have her listen to him all night, regardless of her missing this festival she wanted to go to, but it was clear to him that her focus would be elsewhere.

"Go to your thingy, okay. We'll have this talk when you can give me your undivided attention, kid."

"I'm not a kid," she snapped. Mr. Puffin rolled his eyes.

"Whatever," he said. "If you need me for anything, all you have to do is call my name. You don't even have to use magic to summon me. And don't be afraid to call me in public because you are the only one who can see me. Unless of course, I choose to be visible to others."

"Oh that's good. My dad would probably disown me if he knew that I used magic," she said as she quickly wove her hair into a simple braid. "You know, I don't know where I'm going to hide the book I used to summon you with. If my dad finds it, I'm dead meat."

"I could hold onto it for you," he offered. "I can take anything I want with me to the spirit world and you wouldn't have to worry about your father stumbling across it."

Emilia's face brightened. "That would be great!" she said. She pulled a book out of the closet and laid it on the bed in front of him. He said one word and the book disappeared.

"Could you also hold onto the spell book I bought for my sister?" she asked.

"Of course," he replied. She opened the drawer of the nightstand and presented him with a much thicker volume. "So your sister is a sorceress?" he asked when the book was hidden.

Emilia nodded. "To be honest with you, I never intended to learn magic like her. I grew up believing that magic was evil, and I'm still wary of this whole thing."

He shrugged. "Magic isn't good or evil. It is merely a tool. When a man murders another man with a hammer, do you automatically believe that all hammers are evil?"

"No, I suppose not. But what about demon magic?" she asked. "That seems pretty evil to me."

He smirked. "Demon magic is like a sword; a tool intended for ugly purposes, but in the hands of an honorable man, it becomes a noble weapon with a higher purpose. In fact, a demon magic user with good intentions is the best weapon there is against someone who uses the art for ill. It is a shame that there are so few virtuous men who would learn such a dark art."

"Hm, and what about spirit magic?" she asked. "Are you a hammer or a sword or something else?"

"Do you think I'm some primitive tool used for striking or slicing?" he squawked grumpily. "We spirit animals are not so basic as a hammer or sword; no we are far more complex than that. If you must have a metaphor, I'd say we are libraries, for what other tool puts several thousand years of knowledge right at your fingertips?"

"Several thousand years of knowledge?" she asked, a smile forming on her face. "I like the sound of that."

* * *

It was a long way up the dusty mountain path into the city. Cold wind blew in the faces of Hong, Matthew, Alfred, and Sakura as they hurried up the cliffs along with the rest of the festival attendees who chose to camp in the foothills east of the Verian Mountains. Hong, a man who appeared no older than seventeen, led his small trading company over the red, iron-rich road.

Behind him, his cousins Matthew and Alfred argued over whose fault it was that they were late.

"If you didn't take so much time in the bathroom then we could've left earlier," Alfred said.

Matthew huffed. "Excuse me, I was finished getting ready way before you even started. If you weren't such a procrastinator we'd be there by now."

"Hong-san, your cousins are really loud and obnoxious," Sakura said, a small smirk on her painted lips.

Hong rolled his eyes. "Yeah and you married the more annoying one."

Sakura brought her pink sleeve to her mouth and giggled. It had been forty years since Alfred had returned home from the East with his pretty foreign bride and though his mother had been livid at first, Sakura made a wonderful addition to their family. Her quiet and reserved demeanor balanced out the louder members of the family and she had a head for business that aided them greatly. Not even the shrewdest businessman could read her poker face and Hong often wondered what went on behind her dark eyes.

After the long walk, they finally entered the torch-lit city through the East gate and followed the crowd. Chatter and music filled the air. An ensemble of musicians played on every corner from the edge of the city to the center plaza. The air was warmer in the streets thanks to all the lanterns, torches, bonfires, and the thousands of people milling about.

The group finally made their way to the center plaza. In the middle of the square, a band played, surrounded by a dense mob of dancers. Anyone not dancing either stood about talking, sat at one of the many small tables stationed around the plaza, or hovered around the buffet counters.

The food captured Alfred's immediate attention. The blond man snatched the thigh off a pheasant, gobbled it down, and washed the meat down with a swig of beer. When he was finished eating, he wiped his hands on his dress pants, making Hong and his brother grimace.

He held his hand out to his wife. "Would you like to dance, pretty lady?" he asked her, making her blush. Sakura took his hand and he whisked her away into the crowd of dancers.

Matthew and Hong stood against the wall of the clock tower with numerous other wall flower males like themselves. "The way he acts, it's hard to believe he's technically a ninety year old man," Matthew said, rolling his eyes at his younger brother.

Hong snorted. "Alfred barely acts his physical age. He's like a hyper seven year old. I bet he's going to dance the entire night," he said with slight annoyance, though he had a smile on his face.

Alfred may have been loud and a bit manic, but he was a difficult man to dislike. His optimistic and childlike manner was infectious, and his company was indispensable to their group. Without Alfred around to keep things light, the mood would turn sour very quickly. In addition, the man had an immense intellect hidden behind his happy-go-lucky demeanor. Whenever Alfred struck up a trade agreement with someone, the other person had tendency to underestimate him. Often, the other person would leave feeling like they had cheated Alfred, who in their eyes was just a stupid novice who knew nothing about business, when in fact, Alfred had manipulated the other into giving him the better end of the deal.

"Are you going to dance?" Matthew asked Hong.

He shrugged. "Maybe if someone catches my eye," he said. "You?"

Matthew shook his head. "I'm not really in the mood. Maybe if Gil were here I'd want to…"

Hong nodded in understanding. Matthew had always been reluctant to leave his lover, Gilbert, behind when they left for work. He thought it was unfair that they could go wherever they wanted while everyone back home was stuck. It _was_ unfair, but that made their work all the more crucial. Hong, Matthew, Alfred, and Sakura were their family's only link to the outside world and the only way for them to get necessary supplies.

Something across the plaza perked Matthew's interest as he peered over the crowd.

"Hm," he said, bringing a hand to his lips. "Does she catch your eye?" he asked.

Hong turned his head in the direction Matthew was looking. He didn't have to ask which girl his cousin was talking about.

She held her dress off the ground with pale, dainty hands as her small feet carried her through the crowd. It was bit strange to see a girl from the west wearing a Kiinalainen dress, but Hong couldn't deny that she looked lovely in it. He wondered where she bought it. A strand of her hair came loose from her braid and dangled in front of her eyes. She swept the silvery lock behind her ear. Though her lips smiled and her shoulders were straight and confidant, her blue eyes darted around warily.

Hong shifted away from the wall, considering asking the girl to dance, when a young man approached her. He bowed low to her, holding out his hand in invitation. She curtsied to him and took his hand, letting him lead her to the dance floor. Hong sighed and leaned back against the wall.

"Try being quicker next time," Matthew said.

"Whatever," Hong replied, shrugging.

"I'm going to have a look around the city. See you around," Matthew said, disappearing in to the crowd before Hong could reply. He often wondered how his cousin was able vanish so quickly.

Hong watched the silver haired girl dance three songs with the young man. She was an excellent dancer; her partner appeared uncoordinated in comparison and she seemed to have much more energy than him. During the last song they danced together, he had difficulty keeping up.

When they broke apart, she skipped to the buffet. It seemed that dancing a few songs livened her spirit and made her surer of herself. Hong took a deep breath and made his way to her.

_What do I say to her?_ he thought, hoping he wouldn't make a fool of himself.

"That dress suits you very well. You have a good eye for choosing Zhiganian silk," he said, as she sipped from a cup of mead and nibbled on a cracker.

"Um, thank you, sir," the girl said, a blush coloring her cheeks. He liked the sound of her voice; soft but not weak. She gave him a sheepish smile. "Though, I don't think my eye is that good as I'm unfamiliar with the different varieties of silk."

"Ah, I'm sorry," he said, resisting the urge to smack himself in the face. "I've been a trader for nearly all of my life, so I tend to say things like that."

She shook her head. "It's fine. I'm used to it since my dad is a trader. Because of him, I know a ridiculous amount of information on porcelain."

Hong nodded, but wasn't sure what else to say. He had never felt so tongue tied in his life.

After a moment of silence between them, she curtsied and said, "By the way, my name is E… Ella."

Hong noticed the hesitation over her name, but didn't question it. He bowed to her. "It's a pleasure to meet you Ella," he said. "I'm Hong."

She smiled at him. "Will you dine with me?" she asked.

"It would be an honor," he responded. They both took empty plates and filled them with food. Then, Hong followed Ella to a small table for two that sat underneath a torch.

They ate mostly in silence. While Hong desperately tried to think of something to say to her, Ella would sneak a glance at him, smiling and blushing. When they had eaten most of their food, Ella asked, "May I ask a question?"

Hong wiped his mouth with a napkin. "Of course," he said.

"Are you from Kiina?" she asked, her eyes glimmering with excitement.

He nodded. "I was born in Kiina, but I only lived there for a few years. When I was five, I was sent to this country to live with my aunt. However, I have returned there on numerous occasions."

"What is it like?" Ella asked. The look on her face was one of absolute fascination. "Do people there actually eat their food using two sticks?"

Hong chuckled. "Yes, that's how they eat everything," he responded.

"How does that work?" she asked. "It seems like everything would just slip away."

"It's easy once you get the hang of it," he told her. "Between your dress and your questions, I take it you are interested in Kiina. May I ask why?"

"It's fascinated me ever since I was little," she explained. "Every time my dad goes there he always brings something back for me. Usually he brings back novels and because of that, I've become enamored with the culture. Plus, it's a foreign land. Who knows if I'll ever be able to travel there, but there's something so exciting about imagining a visit to such an exotic place." She gave a short laugh. "My best friend, Elise, always teases me for being so obsessed with a place I've never been."

"There's nothing wrong with wanting to travel," Hong said. He almost offered to take her there, but he reminded himself that he barely knew this girl and he was pretty sure that Ella wasn't her real name.

"Honestly, I don't care much where I go," she said. "I'd just like to get out of the town I live in. It's boring and I have too many bad memories there."

"What happened?" he asked, wondering what could have happened to her to give her such a sad face.

She sighed. "My mom and my older brother are both dead," she began. "My mom died when I was really young, so I don't have that many memories of her, but occasionally something triggers a memory and it's like I lost her all over again. My older sister looks just like her and sometimes when she cooks or cleans, I almost want to call her Mom, but then I remember that Mom is dead and I'll never see her again."

"Then, there's my brother," she continued. "He died eight days before my dad and I left to come here, and every memory of him is still fresh. After his death, just walking around town was hell for me. I'd see all the people he was friends with, all the places he used to go, every damn tree he climbed. The whole town is like this huge ugly reminder that he's gone forever."

"How old was he?" Hong asked.

"He was seventeen; far too young to die," she answered. "God, I don't want to die like that, never having been anywhere or done anything important. The world is so big and I'm just trapped in that tiny, stagnant cage I call home. If I had a choice, I'd leave and never go back. I'd see the entire world."

"I understand that," Hong replied. "I'd go crazy if I had to stay in one place all my life."

"Is that why you're a trader?" Ella asked.

"That is one of the many reasons," he answered. "Mostly, I do it out of necessity, because it's the only way I can help my family. I sell the goods they make and return with the supplies they need."

"So how did you get into trading?" she asked.

"It's the only life I've ever known," he said, shrugging. "My father was a trader and the first years of my life were spent traveling to wherever he needed to go for work. By the time I was five, I had seen more than fifty countries. When my parents died of the plague, I was sent across the world to live with my aunt. She worked as a maid for a very wealthy family and the master of the house put me to work running errands, like going into town and buying from local farmers. Because I had spent my early years watching my father barter, I knew how to get the lowest prices. By the time I was nine, I was allowed to travel to neighboring kingdoms to buy rare goods and I've been a trader ever since."

"You've been doing this since you were nine?" she asked in amazement. "Wow. How old are you anyway?"

"Seventeen," he lied. It was half true. Physically speaking, he was seventeen, though he hadn't aged a day in over two hundred years. But Ella didn't need to know that. "How old are you?"

"Fourteen," she responded.

Hong raised an eyebrow. "Really? I thought you were at least sixteen," he told her and shrugged. "You seem much more mature than any fourteen-year-old I've ever met."

Ella gave him a wide smile. "Thank you," she said, and with a twinkle in her eyes she asked, "Would you like to dance?"

"I'd love to," he said.

She took him by the hand and led him toward the throng of dancers. Ella seemed to come alive at the sound of the spirited music. Her feet moved gracefully over the cobbled ground as she spun and swayed in Hong's arms. Hong felt like he could dance forever with this girl who smiled at him so sweetly, and he prayed that the night would be long.

* * *

Heikki breathed a sigh of relief when he finally reached his destination: a little inn west of the city. It shouldn't have taken this long, but he hadn't anticipated the mountain road would be so treacherous once the sun went down. He had to ride slowly and carefully so that his horse would not trip.

_Why is she having me ride all the way out here when she could have met me in the city?_ he wondered. The inn was certainly out of the way; there was nothing for miles around save for herds of mountain goats and the few merchants camping outside the city. But frustrating as her orders could be, he would never question her. If she sent a raven ordering him to ride for miles away from the city on a rocky mountain road to meet with her in lone inn in the middle of the night, he would do it. Her word was law to him.

He tied his horse to a post and went inside, hanging his coat and hat on a rack beside the door. A fire warmed the cozy parlor. Heikki held his chilled hands above the flames and wondered if she had arrived yet. Surely she would have announced her presence to him.

A sleepy looking innkeeper shuffled into the parlor.

"Can I help you sir?" the innkeeper asked, rubbing sleep from his eyes. "I've got a few rooms available."

"That won't be necessary," Heikki replied. "I'm just waiting to meet with someone. She will be here shortly."

The innkeeper gave him a grumpy look and crossed his arms. "Listen buddy, I'm not going to let you spend the night in my parlor with your lady friend. Get a room, or get out."

Heikki pressed his lips into a flat line. He was not in the mood to deal with other people. "I don't intend to spend the night in your pathetic hovel," he spat, reaching into his pocket for a knife.

"Get out of my inn, fucker, or I'll make you leav—" Before he could finish his sentence, his eyes rolled back into his head as blood spilled from his chest, covering Heikki's hands. Heikki ripped the knife out of the man's chest cavity and let him drop to the floor. He covered his nose as the stench of the man's released bowels reached him.

"Ugh, I'll never get used to that smell," he said in disgust as he pressed the tip of his boot into the man's side. He heard faint girlish laughter that he knew all too well.

He turned around, searching the darkest corners of the parlor. "Where are you my Lady?" he asked into the shadows.

A gust of wind tore through the room along with the sound of a hundred flapping bird wings. Before him a young woman appeared, dressed in indigo robes. Her skin was a fair as an unblemished pearl and her long corn silk hair was pulled away from her face by a satin navy blue ribbon. Heikki bowed to her.

She glanced at the body of the innkeeper and wry smiled graced her lips. "You've been here for barely three minutes and you have already gutted a man," she said with a chuckle. "I always liked that about you." She sighed and shook her head. "How long has it been, Heikki, since we last met? Fourteen, maybe fifteen years? You've gotten old and fat since then. And you are balding."

He ran his fingers through the hair on the side of his head. Not only was he balding, for the past few years his once golden blond hair had been turning lighter and lighter. In another few years his hair would be white.

"Aging is a terrible thing," he said. "You get fat and wrinkled and then your memory starts to go. But you are as lovely and fair as ever, Lady Natalya."

"I see you are still as subtly charming as you always were," she said, rolling her eyes. She looked around the room. "Where is your daughter? I have not seen her since her birth."

Heikki sighed. "We had a disagreement this evening. She refused to leave her room."

"Hm, pity," she said. "Anyway, I suppose you are wondering why I sent for you."

He swallowed nervously. "Indeed I am."

"I must talk to you about the fate of your son." She pulled out several pieces of parchment from a purse at her hip and unfolded them.

"These are the letters you have written to me in the past year and a half," she said. "First, you informed me that your son Tino had ventured into the forest on several occasions and that you had already administered the poison. Your next few letters reported that things were going smoothly and not a soul suspected that anything was amiss. Your latest letter stated that Tino had died in the night, but not from the poison. You said that with his last ounce of strength he escaped from your house and fled to the Atall Forest. Is that correct?"

He nodded. "That is correct, my Lady."

"And have you recovered the body?" she asked.

"No my Lady," he said. "I hired a few men to go into the forest to find it, but they only found an imprint of where he had fallen in the snow, some blood, and tracks from approximately six wolves. The wolves left no trace of him to be found."

"But you have no body, correct? So there is a chance that the boy could be alive."

He shook his head. "No my Lady, that would be impossible. Rest assured that he is dead."

She glared at him. "You know very well that your son carried the same power as you, power that threatens my existence. When I say that I want his body as proof, I expect to receive his body, not your assurance that his final resting place is in the bellies of a pack of beasts."

He lowered his head. "I'm afraid I have nothing to give you but my assurance." Heikki never understood his mistress's orders regarding his children. She had visited him after each of their births, leaving him only with some cryptic rules that didn't entirely make sense to him.

Heikki remembered the day Nora was born. Things had been so good and simple back then. Natalya had allowed him to live an ordinary life, have a normal job as a merchant, get married and settle down with children. In those days, he loved his wife, Sara, and the little girl she gave him. But that was before he knew of Sara's betrayal and before Nora's legitimacy was called into question. If he had known then, would he have begged Natalya for the life of his wife and daughter?

Lady Natalya came to his home that spring day shortly after dusk. Sara was already fast asleep, exhausted from labor. Heikki presented his Lady with the swaddled child. With no more than a single touch, she knew that the babe held a dangerous sort of magic, though she never told him what it was. She only said that the child had to die, as did Sara, for the girl had inherited it from her mother. But Heikki knew of Natalya's mercy firsthand. When he was a child, Natalya found that he carried dangerous magic, but she did not kill him, for he was already her devoted servant. Remembering this, Heikki begged Natalya to spare them as she had spared him and his Lady consented, but left him with these orders: neither Nora nor Sara were allowed to use magic and they were not allowed to enter the Atall Forest. If they broke either of those rules, Heikki would have to kill them himself.

Heikki only had three options: he could let her kill his wife and child and allow Natalya to rest easy, he could agree to Natalya's terms, or he could rebel against Natalya. He would never do the latter. Heikki was loyal to his Lady to his very core. But he had come to love Sara and little Nora, and the ordinary life he had craved for so long. This new life was not something he would give up without a fight. He did not like the terms laid out for him but he figured that her instructions would be fairly easy to follow. It was illegal to use magic in Valkoinen and there was enough lore about the Beast to keep all but the dumbest and the bravest souls out of the Forest. So deciding that it was his best option, Heikki chose to follow his Lady's rules.

When Tino was born two and a half years later in the midst of a blizzard, Natalya paid her loyal servant a midnight visit. He chose to meet with her in the barn, as Tino was a loud, fussy baby and would certainly have woken Sara and Nora. As with Nora, Natalya knew by touching his fair skin the kind of magic the boy possessed. It was not the same magic that Nora and Sara had. Instead, Tino inherited Heikki's power, the same power that his Lady had nearly killed him over and forbade him from ever using. Before Heikki knew what was happening, Natalya removed Tino from his blanket and tossed him out the barn door into the storm.

It took Heikki about a minute to find the baby in the snow because she had thrown him quite far. By the time he found him, Tino's lips and fingers had already turned blue and his arm hung limply, bent unnaturally halfway between his shoulder and elbow. Heikki had never wanted to kill her before, but at that moment, a fire burned in his gut and his blood boiled. He wanted nothing more than to gut her like a pig. He cradled his son in his arms and marched into the barn. He knew where the nearest knife was located and he was ready to grab it, but Tino let out a strangled cry. As tears poured down the baby's face, he knew he had to focus on keeping his son alive, not on getting revenge. So he swallowed his pride and begged her to save Tino. She refused at first, but then she offered the same conditions that were given at Nora's birth. He accepted without a second thought and Natalya warmed the boy and fixed his broken arm. Heikki promised that he would never forget her mercy.

Another two and half years passed and another little girl was born into his family. Natalya came to see Emilia, his sweet summer child at dawn, before anyone else was awake. He was wary of any sudden movements she made as she held the baby, but she only smiled and stroked Emilia's hair. When she handed the girl back to her father, she said, "Do not worry for this one. Her magic is of no threat to me." And with a parting goodbye, she disappeared.

Heikki often wished that everything could have been as simple as it was before he retired from serving Natalya, when his life revolved around her orders and she was the only person whose approval mattered. His job was to kill anyone she needed dead. He never questioned her orders before, and could kill without feeling anything. The light leaving his victims' eyes as they struggled for a last breath never plagued his dreams.

But now that it was his family on the line, his agreement with Natalya haunted him. He had seen many dead children in his life, but before they seemed as nothing more than broken dolls. Now when he remembered their faces, they gazed emptily at him with the eyes of his own children. He began to feel his sanity slipping through his hands like sand. He tried to stay away from home for as long as possible by trading in far off countries. Being gone for months at a time was better finding out one of them broke Natalya's rules and having to kill them. He even hoped that if the rules were broken, that he wouldn't be home to find out.

Whenever he was home, he and Sara fought over everything. He couldn't control his fists. He had never had to, and though some part of him felt she deserved to be hit for speaking to him like that, he hated seeing her crumpled on the floor. Then Sara brought her mother, Akka, to live with them under the pretense that three children were too much to handle while he was away on business. But Heikki knew that Sara wanted her mother there to protect her from him. Honestly, Heikki hoped that Akka would protect Sara from him. A part of him even hoped that with his mother-in-law there to act as a mediator, he could talk to Sara rationally and fix things between them.

From their very first meeting, Heikki knew that Akka hated him. The way her eyes pierced through him made him feel like she knew every bad thing he had ever done. But Heikki could rest easy knowing that she didn't actually know anything of his past. If she knew one iota of the atrocities he had committed, she would have run with her daughter and grandchildren at the first chance she had. Instead, she refused to leave, constantly hovering near her daughter whenever he was in the same room as Sara. It was annoying, but Heikki was thankful that the old woman fulfilled her duty to protect Sara.

Of course, Akka also acted as another caretaker for their children, the "real" reason Sara wanted her mother with them. Akka doted on her grandchildren and she became particularly close with ten-year-old Nora. Both Heikki and Sara felt safe leaving the children with Akka. In hindsight, this was a mistake. The winter after Akka first came to live with them, he had been off trading in the south. He returned a day early, so he knew that they weren't expecting him. Sara's horse was missing from the barn, as was the little pony that his eight-year-old son rode. He assumed that his wife was in town with Tino. Akka was in the house with the girls. He opened the front door to find Akka and Nora sitting on the floor studying several hefty tomes. It was obvious that Akka was teaching his daughter how to do magic.

For a moment the two froze in shock, but then Akka quickly scrambled to hide the books from him. The old woman was too slow. He snatched up the books and grabbed Akka's hand, dragging the barefooted woman outside into the snow. At that moment, Sara came home with Tino. Sara screamed at him, demanding to know what he was doing to her mother. Heikki showed Sara the spell books and told her what he found Akka and Nora doing. It was lucky for him that the one thing he and Sara agreed on was their opinion of magic. Natalya had trained him to hate any magic user other than her and Sara hated it because her father had been murdered by a sorcerer. Finding out that her own mother was a magic user was a serious blow, and for once she took Heikki's side, even going so far as to take her mother's spell books and set them on fire.

They agreed that Akka needed to leave so they had her pack her things. It was nearing twilight when the sobbing woman was finally sent away on her horse and they never saw her again. The children cried, but Sara insisted that her mother had to go. She made sure their kids understood that Grandma did a bad thing by teaching Nora magic. She also interrogated Nora about everything Akka taught her. It seemed that Akka hadn't taught her much, so Heikki decided not to report the incident to Natalya. He reasoned that Nora hadn't deliberately tried to learn magic. Children were naturally curious and the old woman simply took advantage of that fact, so Nora hadn't broken the rules.

For some reason, allying themselves against Sara's mother helped their relationship. It gave them something to talk about that they could agree on and for a while everything was peaceful between them. Every time Heikki came home, Sara greeted him with a smile and a kiss. They didn't fight at all.

But of course, nothing good could ever remain in Heikki's life for long. Less than a year after they kicked Akka out, he happened to come home just as Magnus the butcher was riding away from his house. Magnus greeted him and gave him some story about Sara needing help fixing something. Heikki was doubtful but he didn't show it. Instead, he thanked Magnus for helping his wife and went home. He said nothing about the incident to Sara, deciding to watch her. He didn't want to make an unfounded accusation and ruin everything between them. Over the next few weeks, Sara showed no suspicious behavior and he started to feel silly for thinking that she might be having an affair. But when he followed her into town one last time, he spotted her whispering to Magnus behind his shop. As they parted ways, Magnus gave her a quick peck on the cheek.

When Heikki returned home, Sara was already making dinner. She smiled sweetly at him, but he knew that her smile was nothing more than a lie. Without a word, he knocked her to the ground and began punching her. He yelled at her, demanding to know why she betrayed him. She glared at him and spit in his face.

"You're nothing more than a monster. How could I ever love you?" was all she said. She pushed him off of her and ran out of the kitchen. Heikki sat against a cabinet and cried into his hands. He didn't know how to deal with the overwhelming ache in his chest. He had never felt this kind of pain before but he pushed it away, just like he would have done with physical pain, and a cold numbness fell over his heart.

He never felt guilty for beating Sara ever again, just a bit of glee from seeing her broken and crying on the floor. It made him so happy that he beat her almost every day; sometimes twice a day. But it didn't stop with Sara. He turned on Nora and Tino as well. The children he once held so dear became detestable to him. After beating more information out of Sara, he found that they might not even be his children. His wife had been sleeping with other men even back then, though it seemed that she hadn't slept with anyone other than him around the time Emilia was conceived.

Nora was terrified the first time he hit her but she quickly toughened up to the point where she no longer flinched or cried. Heikki was shocked though at how pathetic his son was. The nine-year-old boy would cry as soon as his father raised a hand to smack him. He decided that Tino would benefit from a good beating every now and then. The boy was acting too much like a girl anyway.

He wanted a reason to kill Sara and that spring he got his reason: he saw Sara enter the Forest. Immediately, he sent a raven to Natalya, letting her know, and a few days later, she sent back a pouch of seeds and instructions on how she wanted Sara killed. Heikki planted the seeds as per her orders, waited for the plant to grow into a bush, and harvested the poisonous leaves when they were ready. He poisoned her food, Sara fell "ill", and eight months later she was dead. Not one person suspected him.

Nora and Tino became his next two big problems. Nora was far too strong-willed for his taste. The girl bowed to no man and by the time she was seventeen, she sent three prospective husbands running, rightfully earning the name "Ice Princess." Even if he had been a forgiving man, Heikki could never have forgiven her for ruining a marriage to a prince. But Nora was not a horse to be broken. The more he beat her, the harder she became to break.

Then there was Tino. He was too friendly, too sweet, too optimistic, and he did not show enough interest in girls. Heikki suspected that Tino had been sneaking around with men for a while but it wasn't until that day he caught him kissing Eduard von Bock in the barn that he knew for sure. Heikki was livid both at Tino and at himself. He should have prevented Tino from having such sick desires. All he could do was try and find a way to fix Tino, but he honestly had no idea how he would go about it. Then, Tino entered the Forest and fixing him was no longer his job. Heikki reported to Natalya and she gave him the same orders she gave for Sara. Heikki only felt a slight twinge of guilt at killing his son, but he pushed it away. Tino grew weaker every day and shortly after his seventeenth birthday he was in his final days. Heikki did not anticipate that Tino would escape into the forest, but for Natalya to think that the boy could possibly be alive was insane.

"My Lady, even if he did not succumb to the poison, or the cold, or the wolves, who would be there to save him?" he questioned, snapping out of his reverie. "Aside from the Beast, that is."

She glared at him. "You know nothing, so don't question me."

Heikki resisted the urge to groan in frustration. "Please explain to me how he could be alive. It seems highly improbable to me, but you may know something that I don't."

"There is a beast in that forest," she started. "But it is no man eating monster. It is my own nephew. I placed a curse on him and his household many years ago and they all should be dead, but my nephew seems to be much cleverer than I ever realized. Somehow he has managed to keep them all alive for more than two centuries and in that time he has created a small army out of his household that is powerful enough to take on my followers. Thankfully they are trapped in their castle but if they are ever freed, they would hunt me to the ends of the earth. And it is possible that they could have saved Tino. If they find out that his power could kill me easily, they will defend him with their lives."

Heikki's eyes widened. "I—I didn't know that," he said. "What do you require me to do?"

She smirked. "Why, nothing at all. I intend to release an army of demons into the Forest to finish the job. I figure I should have gotten rid of everyone in that forest long ago anyway. I might as well kill two birds with one stone."

"But my Lady, what about the towns near the Forest?" he asked. He had grown to enjoy living in his home in Valkoinen and would hate to be forced to move.

"Don't worry about that," she said. "I will have my demons enter through the northern-most edge of the forest where there are no towns, and once they are in, they will be trapped by the barrier my brother put in place long ago. Then they will flock to the castle and kill every last person there."

He breathed a sigh of relief. "I see. It's a good plan my Lady."

"Isn't it?" she asked. "But before that, my army needs to eat if they are going to destroy my nephew. And what better feast is there for an army of demons than the annual festival here in Punainen?"

"You don't mean they are going to kill everyone in the city, do you?" he asked.

"Of course," she said, like it was the most natural thing in the world. "Where else do people gather in such numbers? It is perfect for my army."

"But I left Emilia in the city!" he yelled.

"Ah yes, such a pity, but I did tell you to bring your daughter with you."

"Can you hold off the demons for just a little bit longer? Please let me find Emilia!" he begged.

"I'm sorry Heikki, but the city is already under attack. Your daughter is likely dead. Poor thing. Now, we must be off. I will be staying in your house until my army has done its job. I suggest we get moving as soon as possible."

"Please, just let me look for her," he begged.

She shook her head. "Every time you ask me to spare someone, things always turn out for the worst. Perhaps you should stop asking questions and follow your orders," she said with a cold, cruel gleam in her eyes.

Heikki swallowed the panic and despair rising in his throat. "Yes my Lady," he said, nodding. If Natalya ordered it, he had to abandon his daughter to the demons. He had no other choice.

* * *

So in my original plan, there was supposed to be one chapter introducing Emilia and then I'd get back to Tino and everyone in the castle by chapter six. But then this thing ended up being super freaking long, so I had to cut it in half (yes, what you have here is only half of what I intended to write for chapter five). Next chapter will focus on Emilia and Hong again, only this time, they get to escape a demon army. Yay =D It shouldn't be too long until the next chap comes out, especially since I'm going back to school soon. Let me know what you think so far.

~Firewolf


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